Ephemerality
by Celestially
Summary: Dante would always be himself: annoying, annoyingly handsome, and a constant reminder of her human mortality. Lady wasn't sure where she was going, but she was getting there very quickly. - DxL, companion to "The Passage of Time." DISCONTINUED
1. Prologue

**(This was updated on June 26th, by the way—realized there were a couple of inconsistencies that needed to be patched up. If you read this chapter before June 26th at about 8 PM EST, then please at least skim it again until you find the new information)**

Okay, I know I said this would be planned, written, and posted after I finished _The Passage of Time_, but I've been inspired on how I want to see this done and can't resist starting it now. And because I've been so terrible at updating recently, I've decided to treat you guys to some Lady-POV goodness in preparation for the goodness that will be the next chapter of _PoT_. Wiiiiiiiiiiiink.

I'm not sure how many chapters there are going to be in this thing, but they're going to be shorter, focusing on Lady's perspective on specific moments that compliment the overall story. I still want you guys to tell me what you'd like to see in this fic (what moments you would like clarified, etc) so please continue letting me know if there's something you want to see written from Lady's perspective!

For further information on what's to come, check out my profile—I posted when I see my fics updating again, as well as teaser summaries for upcoming chapters. It's worth checking out! I totally wrote this at work, by the way. HAHA!

Meanwhile, I still don't own _Devil May Cry_.

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read **_**The Passage of Time**_**! (or as much as I've posted, anyway) The prologue corresponds with events that occur before both the story and **_**DMC3**_** itself, but still spoils some details that Lady reveals to Dante over the course of the story.**

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**Ephemerality**

_Prologue_

She had taken to thinking of herself as seventeen years old, despite the fact that she was still a few months short of her seventeenth birthday. The way she saw it, she was a gun-wielding, motorcycle-driving, ass-kicking demon hunter, something that a _sixteen_-year-old was too immature to even comprehend. Sixteen-year-olds didn't deal with everything she had just dealt with and was about to deal with.

Granted, _seventeen_-year-olds didn't either. Neither did eighteen-year-olds, nor anyone else, for that matter. Simply put, _normal people_ did not have to deal with this particular brand of bullshit. Demons were a silly myth to everyone else, just as they had once been to her. But now the veil was lifted, and thanks to her _wonderful_ father she would never view the world in the same way again.

_Asshole_.

This was what she kept on telling herself as she rode her motorcycle into a city nearly 800 miles from her home. The trip had been as impromptu as it seemed to both the school and her estate lawyers, who hadn't taken well to her decision but couldn't do much about it. As far as they were concerned, she had finally succumbed to the trauma of her mother's murder and needed some time to do some soul-searching. The school ultimately agreed with her; she would find a way to make up the rest of her assignments when she returned in two months for the second semester. Her lawyers were less pleased, worried about the balance of the account and the future of the estate as she continued to pay tuition at the school and squander her money on God knows what else, but she promised to deal with it when she returned. Meanwhile, she needed to leave, and nobody could stop her.

Four months later, she was still receiving a slew of phone calls from both the headmaster's office and her lawyer's office, demanding to know when she would be back, when she planned on finishing her education or at least taking some_ responsibility_ if she wanted to be an emancipated minor—and what was she supposed to tell them? That she was still driving down random roads to towns all over the region in search of her father? That said father was conspiring with some demon to unveil some mystical demon edifice or something? That the reason she had left in the first place was that the man she had been secretly paying to find her father had finally gotten a lead, and that it was time for her to take matters in her own hands?

If they hadn't already done so they would have stopped her at "conspiring with some demon." Either way, she ignored their calls and deleted their voicemails.

Whether or not they would have believed her, it was the truth: her father, despite appearing to be your average CEO, had always had an interest in the supernatural, which he hid from everyone except for her. He had told her stories about demons that lived in another world and of the demon, Sparda, who sealed that world away from ours. As a child it had fascinated her, filling her mind with fantasies that she and her father would share as they looked through his extensive library of demon myths. Naturally she stopped believing once she got older—it didn't help that nobody else in her middle school knew the stories or believed her if she ever brought them up—much to her father's dismay. She had always felt a little guilty about the fact that she shunning what she and her father once shared, but in hindsight she knew that she shouldn't feel as guilty about hurting his feelings as she should about dismissing such stories as silly fairy tales.

A huge chunk of her father's library had gone missing with him. The detectives had asked her what she knew about her father's interest in demonology given the fact that her mother's murder looked suspiciously like a ritual of some kind, but she had held her tongue and claimed ignorance. She knew that something was up and wanted to settle this _herself_, outside of the realm of the law, because this entire matter—this bullshit perversion of her life—transcended most everyone's definition of "normal."

It was funny, she thought, that her way of coping with everything was not to embrace what little slice of her former, normal life she had left, but to push away everything that was normal and good in favor of hunting down the bad. She had no family to return to, so she emancipated herself and lived full-time at school, where she avoided her friends in favor of reading up on the occult and physical training. Even her boyfriend—who was, in her words, "aggressively normal" in his ability to stand out while fitting in so well—was too much of a reminder of what had once been so simple and good. So she pushed him away, or maybe he pushed her away; she couldn't remember exactly but knew that they were apart a few months after her return to the school. Everyone knew that she had changed, but because her grades never slipped the school couldn't call her out on it and force her to see a therapist, though they could _strongly advise_ her to do so.

Not that she listened. She was fine, really, she had just reprioritized. She needed to settle this thing with her father and stop him from doing whatever he had done to her mother to anyone else. She refused to see him commit such atrocities again, earning and breaking anyone else's trust just like he had broken hers and her mother's. That sick _fuck _wasn't her father anymore. He didn't even _look_ like her father anymore, if the picture that the private detective she hired had taken was any indication—all scarred and balding with beady, familiarly heterochromatic eyes...

That was that: she would just have to kill him. She picked up and left, leaving her old name behind her and becoming some nameless person, driving down empty roads in search of the disgusting man who once was her father. She had spent a lot of time training and tricking out her new motorcycle and even newer rocket launcher—called Kalina Ann, because despite being a somewhat demure woman she knew that her mother would be happy knowing that something named after her was blowing up demons.

Demon. The word felt acrid, not scary and familiar and exciting like it had been as a child.

She crossed paths with her father on her journey, but only once: her informant had called her to report her father's location only days after she had set out. She had acted impulsively and rather naively, immediately driving to meet and confront him. Unsurprisingly, she didn't get anywhere near him, only catching a glimpse of the man at a distance—though she had been able to see in person how her father had changed, how grave he had become, and how that scar moved in waves across his neck and head. It had been a wakeup call, a confirmation of what she had already decided: this man was _not_ the man she had once known and loved.

Before she could get closer so as to settle things once and for all, she was ambushed by demons. They were disgusting, with glowing eyes on deformed faces, twisted bodies covered in tattered robes—nothing like the divinely beautiful creatures her father had once shown her. It was her first real fight, finally fighting something other than a punching bag, or the beautiful demons of her imagination lunging at her with swords. She had been shaky and clumsy, and she walked away with several slashes, including a shallow one over the bridge of her nose. She didn't want to waste time getting them treated professionally, so she bandaged them as best as she could and resigned herself to some scars.

One good thing about this encounter, despite getting nowhere near her father, was that it had finally given her some experience against demons. As she continued following her father, he and his demonic associate—named Vergil or something, as she eventually learned—left a trail for her to follow, one of demons and death. She never got as close to them as she had the first time, but instead found herself cleaning up some of the messes they had left. While she was grateful for the experience—as she was sure that if they got to where they wanted to be, she would be dealing with more than just four or five demons—she was horrified by the deaths that she had been unable to prevent, ones that would be chalked up as murders that would never be solved because "demons didn't exist." Her father was letting these _creatures_ destroy lives in his wake, perhaps as human sacrifice, just like her mother had been.

She followed him for what ended up being four months, one week, and three days, long enough for the original wounds and a few other scratches that she gained in other fights to heal, albeit poorly. The longer she waited, the more deaths she saw; and the more people died, the more she wanted to see _him_ dead.

Now, driving into the city 800 miles from her own where her father had apparently last been spotted, she could feel something strange rumbling that wasn't her engine—the people on the street didn't notice, carrying on with their days as if nothing had gone wrong or was about to go wrong. It only took a few minutes of driving attentively down the street when, all of a sudden, the pavement around her shattered. Buildings crumbled, dropping debris both on the pavement and pedestrians alike, and she swerved out of the way to avoid getting hit herself. She barely heard the sounds of people screaming over the sound of concrete smashing into concrete and her tires screeching against the cracked ground, swerving through the streets and past pedestrians that stood, still as statues, watching the sky with their mouths agape and eyes wide with terror. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a dark tower erupt from the ground, silhouetted against the vivid orange sky above her—the clouds were thick, so it would probably rain later. Hopefully put out some fires that the firemen couldn't get to, if they survived.

The buildings soon stopped falling apart, and the sound of concrete breaking was replaced by several sharp, painful screams that abruptly cut off—people dying, she realized. Skidding to a stop, she looked around to see if she could spot anyone who was in trouble, but to no avail. The silence was intimidating: she was alone on the street, and yet there was something all around her, like death or responsibility or something else that she couldn't identify. She saw demons around her, out of the corners of her eyes, lurking in the shadows of crumbled buildings, next to corpses she could barely see in the dying light of the day. She had recently decided that these kinds of demons—the ones with mangled bodies and terrible faces—were the ones that were normal, and that the beautiful ones, if they really existed, were the exceptions to the rule of monstrosity. The demons definitely saw her, but before she could draw her gun to get rid of some of them before they got too close, she noticed exactly what was in front of her.

She was sitting on her motorcycle in front of a massive tower, tall as the sky, looking as scary and familiar and exciting as all of the drawings her father had shown her as a child. She wasn't sure if she grimaced in horror or smirked in bizarre satisfaction as she said: "I found it."

The shadows continued moving around her as the demons lurking behind her grew closer. A part of her wanted to turn around and look at her assailants in a better light—see what she was up against—but she knew that they would spring to attack if she did and she was already worried about running out of ammo. Instead she opted to take advantage of the element of surprise, revving her engine and allowing the flames that erupted from her modified tailpipe to engulf whatever was right behind her. As she sped off towards the tower, the scent of something burning barely brushing her nostrils as the demons were charred, she let the shadow of sixteen-year-old Mary fall behind for good and allowed herself to assume the identity of seventeen-year-old _Someone_—still nameless, and she was fine with that as long it ended with her standing over her father's bloody corpse.

It was going to be a long night.


	2. The Guy in Red

I know I said that I would finish _PoT_ before doing much here, but the beginning of this chapter came to me when I was on vacation and since these chapters are a lot shorter than my usual fare, I figured i wouldn't be too bad if I went ahead and finished it. The last chapter of _PoT_ (epilogue obviously excluded) is giving me a bit of trouble right now, particularly since my writing time was limited over the past two weeks when I was away, so I wanted to give you guys a _little_ something to make up for the wait. _Ephemerality_ chapters will be shorter than the usual _PoT_ fare, so it doesn't take me that much time to write!

Thank you guys for the response! I was a bit concerned about the slow start (and I want to give anonymous a quick personal thanks here: before I got the other reviews, your review helped reassure me that _someone _was reading... I was so nervous, praying that a review would come in!) but I'm glad to see that people are at least a little excited to see Lady's point of view on everything that happened. Believe me, I'm excited to write it!

So keep letting me know what you want to see, and I'll keep writing! Well, after I finish the last bit of _PoT_ anyway. I should probably do that.

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case I.1) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

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**Ephemerality**

_1: The Guy in Red_

(corresponds to a moment before the start of I.1: Youthful Ambitions)

Well. She'd had better days.

One minute she was staring down her bastard of a father—whose mutilated appearance she had grown strangely used to since her last brief glimpse of him, in part due to finding that his suddenly deepened voice and acerbic personality shift suited his overall demonically-influenced look—the next she found herself tumbling through the air, her father having unceremoniously tossed her off the building. He had a strange, unrepentant grimace on his face, which would have been proof that her real father was gone if she hadn't already realized that he had been reduced to a disfigured shell of his former self. The only thing that remained were his heterochromatic eyes, a mahogany and teal pair that matched her own, evoking a slew of emotions from nostalgia to disgust at the idea that there was still something that they outwardly shared, some physical proof that they were related.

It was funny: this man could no longer be called Jonathan Arkham, just as she no longer wanted to be called Mary.

She had attempted to shoot him as she fell backwards, a final, desperate attempt against her assailant as she began her long plummet towards the ground. She was pretty sure that she missed—if he _had_ been hit, he hadn't flinched. Either way she couldn't see him anymore, having long since lost sight of the alcove upon which she had stood. All she could see was the dark, colorless stone of the tower exterior as she whizzed past.

She might have been scared, but any feelings of terror were being masked with overwhelming disappointment. She had _failed:_ her "father" was still alive, the tower still standing, the nefarious plot still underway, and she was going to _die_, reduced to a splatter against the crumbled, distant pavement. Yet again there was always a chance, if she twisted her body a bit, that she could run Kalina Ann's bayonet into the wall to slow her fall; but at the speed she was dropping she wasn't sure if that would do much other than rip her shoulders from their sockets. Despite all realistic outcomes, though, she didn't have many other options at this point, particularly as dying was out of the question tonight, so steeled herself for her next move, preparing herself for what could be a world of pain.

Which was why she was so surprised to feel a strong hand grab onto her right ankle, forcing her to an incredibly jerky stop. She grunted, half out of surprise and half out of the pain—she felt as though her leg were about to be ripped from her hip, her head swimming at the sudden inertia. However, she had been saved, though the question of who or what had saved her and _why_ was still an issue.

Glancing up at her savior once her vision cleared, she immediately recognized the red leather, white hair, and cocky smile. It was _that guy_: "the guy in red," she had called him. The one she had tried to shoot at the base of the tower. She felt a little bad for doing that, in hindsight, but she had been freaked out by the idea that a human—herself excluded—would be foolish enough to walk into a demon-infested building. And then, when she had heard him spout off about parties and some other bullshit that she _really_ didn't have time for, she figured she would scare him a bit while blowing a hole in the wall that she could use to continue her path up the tower, letting the missile get a little close to him. Apparently it had gotten too close and he had somehow miraculously _ridden it_ for a bit before jumping away unscathed—this guy was either smart and skilled or dumb and lucky, or some combination thereof. She had hoped to scare him at least, but he was staring back at her with the same, stupid grin, completely unperturbed by the fact that she had nearly hit him with a missile. Jumping her bike over his head produced similar results.

A part of her wanted to apologize to him—though a bit unsure if "I'm sorry I almost blew you up earlier, I just wanted to get you to leave" was a truly acceptable apology—but that urge was quickly suppressed when she noticed the disturbingly interested expression on the guy in red's face as he glanced down at her.

He was totally checking her out. She was dangling off of a fucking demonic tower, and he was trying to stare up her skirt.

Her guns were out faster than she had ever drawn them, even in the face of a swarm of demons. She had never been too fond of guys looking at her—even when she had been dating David, she had always felt uncomfortable under his gaze—but under these particular circumstances it felt especially inappropriate. Both of their lives, not to mention the fate of the _world, _were at stake as her asshole father and his demon friend continued to execute their mysterious plan, and he was too busy picturing her _naked_ to care! What was he even doing there? Okay, so he had a sword and guns, so did he fancy himself a demon hunter? Yeah, right, he was probably just some stupid jock—and who did he think he was with that white hair that was _obviously fake_?

She was adding a series of new nicknames to the guy in red—"stupid pervert jock," "bleached boy," and "arrogant bastard"—when he opened his mouth and, to her utmost horror, pulled a pickup line on her: "Well, this is my kind of rain." She rolled her eyes, but he didn't notice, as he looked up to the sky as if waiting for something—or someone—else to fall from the sky. That was unlikely, unless she had any sisters that she didn't know about. "No wonder the sky looks so funny today."

What, the big demonic presence wasn't enough to fuck with the weather? Adding another nickname to the list—"_idiot_"—she decided that if she had to choose between falling to her death and being rescued by this buffoon, she would rather risk death. "Let me go!" she insisted while thrusting her guns forward slightly, a threat in case he decided that he wasn't going to comply with her. She would shoot him, too. He would die in the tower anyway, ripped to pieces by some demon—the only reason he was still alive at this point was probably because he had followed the path _she_ had cleared, so he wouldn't be able to make it much farther anyway. What did he expect to do, kill her father and his demonic partner? He didn't look like he could even tie his shoes, much less save the world. The pretty ones were _so_ stupid.

Ugh. She had just called him _pretty_. And it was true: he was rather attractive, but the positive qualities ended there.

"Let you go?" Arrogant Bastard asked, and his voice was _infuriatingly condescending_. "But it would be a waste if you ended up as just a pretty stain."

Well, that was it. He was going to let go of her now, whether he wanted to or not. She fired one of her guns, the bullet quickly tearing into his forehead, causing his head to whip back. Maybe that was a little bit cruel—okay, yes it was, she had just shot the poor guy—but she didn't feel as much remorse as she probably should have. If he wasn't going to take her seriously, then fine, she just had to prove how serious she could be, though a part of her wondered whether it was worth the cost of an innocent life.

As the guy in red staggered backwards, his hand released her ankle, and she resumed her path towards the pavement. However, now prepared, she swung Kalina Ann off of her shoulder and drove it into the wall, grunting at the resistance but persisting nonetheless. The bayonet tore open a fissure with a sickening screech, little pieces of rock shooting towards her as she continued falling. She was surprised to find that her plan was working quickly and efficiently as she gradually slowed down before stopping short—she guessed that it was because she hadn't been falling enough to reach a particularly high speed. She was jolted around for a split second, but her grip against the missile launcher held firm and she was left dangling on the wall, heart drumming, stomach lurching, and arms a little sore, but otherwise unharmed.

A part of her wanted to laugh in relief—she couldn't believe that had _actually worked_—but she wasn't sure where to head from there. She could try to remove Kalina Ann from the wall and attempt to climb up or down towards the nearest alcove, but the surface of the tower wall didn't appear to be good for climbing. There was always the grappling function on her bayonet, but how far down would the wire take her before running out? There was no guarantee that she would be anywhere _near_ another alcove or balcony or area that she could step onto. She felt ... well. _Trapped_.

"What the hell was that for?" she heard a voice angrily demand from above her.

Blanching, she looked up: it was the guy in red. To her utmost horror, he seemed perfectly unscathed. Had her shot missed? No, he had a smear of blood in the center of his forehead, where she had just _fatally wounded him, but no bullet hole_. He should have been _dead_, and while a part of her was relieved by the fact that she hadn't taken an innocent, albeit obnoxious life, _he should have been dead_.

"Here I am trying to help you and you show your thanks by _shooting_ me?" he continued, seemingly _annoyed_ by the fact that he had been shot. Shouldn't he have been, well, _terrified_ of his near-murderer? This guy...

He wasn't human.

Without any shred of hesitation—and certainly without any of the twinges of guilt that she had felt last time—she fired up at him again, the bullet smashing into his face and sending him careening backwards, just like last time. She quickly swung herself up, landing in a crouch on top of Kalina Ann with one hand against the tower wall, aiming back up at the spot that he had just disappeared from. Whatever he was, if he had recovered from one shot to the head, she guessed that he would recover from a second one. He would be back soon, and she wondered: would he fire back at her? She had seen the guns in their holsters earlier, and he might have already been itching to use them against her after the first bullet, a feeling that would probably be doubled by her second shot.

Unsurprisingly, he appeared again, this time spitting out the bullet like something he thought was disgusting. "Whatever, do as you please," he said, walking away from the edge, shrugging her off with the same inappropriate annoyance that he had used earlier. She faintly heard him mutter something under his breath, but whatever it was, she couldn't make it out.

She felt herself relaxing despite herself, hesitantly lowering her gun and looking away from where the guy in red had been standing with some horror. "So he's a demon too," she heard herself whisper, everything uncomfortably clicking together in her mind. There he was: there was the kind of demon she had waited to see, human in appearance despite being inhumanly beautiful and as terrible and powerful as the demonic blood coursing through his body would imply. She had completely underestimated him, passing off his flippant behavior as stupidity—well, he could still be an idiot, but he was a _strong_ idiot. A _demonic_ idiot. An idiot who could have killed her in his grip, or not even have caught her in the first place despite having the ability to do so, but did anyway. Why? Why had he saved her? He was a _demon_, and demons weren't to be trusted, as she had already learned.

What was perhaps more worrying was the fact that he was some kind of "superior demon," not able to be taken down by a well-aimed bullet like the other ones she had been fighting for several months now. Was he the demon that her father was working with? No, he wasn't—too stupid, and, oddly enough, too _nice_. He didn't seem to be the type that would _ever_ work with the man that her father had become, and loath as she was to go off of such a subjective hunch, it was all she had. She would have to keep an eye on him as best as she could until she could determine where he stood in all of this.

Not that it mattered. Either way she would have to kill the guy in red before the end of the night, just like every other demon in there. It was just a matter of figuring out how she would do so.

But first, she would have to figure out how to get onto solid ground again.

"Damn it," she muttered, staring at the long drop below her, brushing back some sweaty locks of hair that were sticking to her face. This wouldn't be easy.


	3. Protection

Here's the next chapter of _Ephemerality_, as requested by Anonymous! And it's so funny that you noticed the two different first names for Arkham—the reason why I changed the names is that pre-ritual Arkham, in both cases, are two different people. In _Passage of Time/Ephemerality_, Jonathan Arkham is the find of guy who is very straight-laced and waspy but ultimately kind, whose interest in the demonic (and subsequent desire to be a demon) kind of comes out of nowhere. Victor Arkham in _Observance_ is as businesslike as Jonathan but has a less close relationship to his family—also, the name Victor is supposed to hint at his Eastern European roots, which is more to help solidify the specific details of Lady's religious background (both parents are Orthodox Christian but Victor has abandoned religion where Kalina Ann continues to embrace it). The nuances of Lady's personality are different in both stories, so I didn't want to confuse them by giving both Arkhams the same name.

ANYWAY, I keep on saying that I'm going to update _The Passage of Time_ next, but a part of me wants to keep going with this one. It's not that I want to drag out _PoT_ so much as I have all of this stuff for _Ephemerality_ that I want to post, and only two chapters left in _Passage of Time_! So please indulge a few more chapters of _Ephemerality_ before I get to the next chapter of _PoT_—if you've noticed, _Ephemerality_ chapters have a quick turnover time because they're shorter, and the _Passage of Time_ chap is already about half-written. (I say about because I'm not entirely sure how long some of these are going to be.)

Actually, this one took the longest to write, in part due to the infection I've been battling (hard to do anything but play _Kingdom Hearts_ when I'm not at work, particularly when I'm at the back-to-back badassery with Captains _Gay—_can you tell what my KH OTP is?) It also took a really long time because there was so much content to cover. Originally I was going to rewrite the entire chapter, but as I got to a certain point I realized that I would rather cap it off sooner. After all, this fic is a series of "moments," not entire scenes per se. Well, unless the scenes are shorter. Either way, the two "halves" of the original chapter have two very specific tones, and I didn't want to mesh them together. Unless I get a bunch of requests to write that part as well, I'm just going to move on to the Dante/Lady fight scene in the library. Because you all want to see that. ;)

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case I.2) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

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**Ephemerality**

_2: Protection_

(corresponds to a moment within I.2: Blood and Bloodlines)

Vergil.

That was the name that was pounding in her head, tinting the edges of her vision red with complete and utter fury.

_Vergil._

If you had told her, fifteen minutes earlier, that she would be crying over her father's corpse before stalking down a powerful demon to avenge him, she would have ... well, the idea would have been absolutely preposterous. Now she was doing just that, and while she was questioning her own sanity, it was all she could do. Her father had apparently been there all along, repressed by his companion's demonic influence. She had seen his true self shining out despite the warped voice and scarred visage—everything that had made them close, his smiles and laughs and even the moments when he scolded her—and she loved it. She had seen her real father again, confused and scared and repentant.

Who was she to deny her father, the only thing she had left? _Had_, she needed to stress: now he was dead too, and she was nearly the one to kill him.

The idiot demon in red had been leaving a path for her to follow—now _she_ was following _him_ and not the other way around as it had likely been earlier, she realized, though she wasn't laughing at the irony. She wasn't sure what he was doing in the tower, but they seemed to tenuously be on the same side. They had briefly fought alongside each other before he ran away to leave her in a room filled with demons, the bastard; but then, later on, they had fought _each other._ Granted, he hadn't fought her so much as staved her off, something that annoyed her greatly: it was as if he didn't believe that she could do anything to hurt him, or that she was worth "saving." Hadn't she proven to him earlier that she didn't need him to help her? She could take care of herself, as she already had, with the exception of that one moment as she was falling off of the tower, which she actually ended figuring out for herself.

So _there_.

When she found the guy in red again, he was fighting another guy, seemingly identical but with slicked back hair and wearing blue. He must have been a demon too—did all demons look alike? She guessed so, because she couldn't imagine any human sharing that appearance. It was almost intimidating how quickly they were moving, slicing at each other with a legitimate desire to kill, unlike the weaker, defensive blows that Red had been treating her to earlier. They didn't seem to notice her arrival, which she found odd given the fact that Red had been so attune to her presence earlier. She guessed it was just her lucky timing: she could fire a missile at them and they wouldn't notice, and then there would be two less demons to worry about. She swung Kalina Ann over her shoulder and, taking aim, fired. To her utter dismay Blue spotted the missile flying towards them and jumped back—Red suddenly swung around and sliced the missile in half, with Blue swinging it again so that it fell to the ground in useless quarters.

She met Blue's eyes, and in that moment, she knew that he was the mastermind behind all of this. _Vergil_. He was staring back at her with a strange, reserved interest that made chills run down her spine. And not the good kind.

"Sorry, but this is no place for a little girl," she heard Red say, his voice as harsh as it had been after she shot him, "so beat it."

Did he really think she cared what _he_ thought? She was here on business. "Shut up!" she exclaimed, wheeling her rocket launcher on him and firing.

Red jumped back, dodging the missile, and Vergil followed him, continuing the fight that she had just interrupted. Not one to be ignored, she ran forward, preparing to thrust Kalina Ann's bayonet into whichever of the two demons got closest to her. But Vergil broke away from the other demon, parrying them both before she could stab him and causing her—both of them, actually—to stagger backwards. He then continued his attack against her, striking Kalina Ann with his katana a second time; still disoriented from his previous assault, she lost balance on impact, spinning and tumbling to the floor a few feet away.

Turning over onto her back, she saw Vergil jumping at her again, katana raised to strike. Her eyes widened, and she fought off the urge to freeze completely, silently willing her limbs to move again to dodge or do _something_ to avoid his blade. Red bought her some time by attempting to attack Vergil himself—honestly, it was the one useful thing he had done for her this entire night, other than leading her to this room in the first place—but was knocked back. Still, it was enough time for her to grab Kalina Ann, raising it to block just as Vergil spun, landed, and bore his katana down.

They were stuck in that pose, Vergil forcing down just as she was pushing back up. Somehow, she found the strength to yell: "You forced him into this!" She was a little embarrassed by the way that her voice cracked in that moment, but in her defense a demon was trying to kill her, so it was a miracle that she could speak at all.

To her surprise, Vergil's attack weakened, though not enough to push him away completely. He locked eyes with her and his face softened slightly in realization, a combination of taking in her words and, if her father hadn't already told him, seeing the family resemblance. She was a little embarrassed to admit that his face, like Red's, was surprisingly handsome, though colder and sharper than the other demon's. It seemed a shame that these powerful demons were so attractive—all of the _human_ men she had met couldn't hold a candle to them.

Not that she planned on having anything to do with them anyway. They were _demons_, dangerous and untrustworthy all at once.

"Is that what you think?" Vergil asked, his face slipping back into a more neutral mask as the pieces clicked together. "Foolish girl," he added.

She noticed the condescension in his voice, which should have been more than enough reason to motivate herself to lunge forward again and kill him, but her mind was suddenly reeling. Why was Vergil making her question her father's words? Was he just trying to trick her?

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Red lunging forward to strike at Vergil; she felt a little torn by the action, wanting the satisfaction of killing Vergil herself, but she had to admit that she was too distracted to do much good. Vergil noticed where she was looking and spun to block Red—she felt a little guilty, ruining the surprise of the attack like that—and as the two demons continued fighting each other, she spun to get out of the way of their swords.

Vergil was making her doubt her father, something that was simultaneously horrifying and legitimate. He was her father, but he had betrayed her before. Had he really been under Vergil's spell as he had claimed, or had it been a lie so that she could kill Vergil and not give him the satisfaction of achieving _their_ goal?

She heard a grunt and, snapping her head to attention, saw that Red had just slashed Vergil's side, and was just starting to swing his sword for another attack when his eyes met hers for a brief moment, his gaze soft and questioning. Just as quickly as he had looked at her his eyes shot forward in pain: Vergil's katana sliced him through the stomach, causing him to stagger back, winded. They both fell to their knees, panting and clutching at respective wounds, heads lowered to hide their expressions of pain. The room fell quiet, their heavy breaths white noise against the cacophony of thoughts in her head.

Suddenly, she heard someone clapping, and her eyes scanned the room to find the source. It wasn't the two demons: they each had one hand keeping them up from the floor and the other still tightly gripping their swords, parallel poses that seemed to make them seem even more physically alike.

"Bravo, bravo!" she heard a voice say from behind her as a clown-like man in a purple outfit stepped out of the shadows, a stupid grin adorning his face. Something about this figure gave her the absolute creeps, and she suppressed a shudder, turning away to avoid staring at him. "I never dreamed that things would go so smoothly." The footsteps stopped, but she refused to look towards him. "Well done, everyone. Well done!"

The two demons seemed to find the strength to stand at the clown's appearance, both wearing matching expressions of disgust. Red, in particular, seemed annoyed to see this new figure, which he made clear when he growled: "You!"

The clown didn't answer him though, and she suddenly felt a shiver run down her spine. Frowning, she turned, only to find that the clown had moved to right next to her. He grabbed onto Kalina Ann, dragging her forward as he made a strange, lewd slurp with his tongue, causing her to flinch lightly. "Don't be a bad girl, Mary," he said menacingly, and she suddenly felt her entire body go weak. How did he know her name? The only one here that would have known her real name was—

She suddenly felt herself being thrown up into the air, landing painfully on her stomach. All of her muscles felt weak, the aches of the night already starting to catch up with her. She couldn't bring herself to stand.

"Or you can expect a spanking from Daddy later!" the clown continued. She cringed at the reference to fathers, wondering what kind of sick creature this was. He was obviously some kind of demon, but he wasn't _like_ Vergil and Red. He was different, and not just in appearance—and it wasn't better or worse necessarily, just that everything this clown demon did seemed to give her the chills. "Jester's gonna spank your butt. Spank you on the bu—!"

"Insane buffoon!" Vergil interrupted the demon—Jester, apparently—'s song and dance, standing in a combat position with sword drawn.

To the side, she saw Red's face tighten with frustration, and if she recognized the emotion correctly, jealousy?

"I don't know where you came from, but you don't belong here," Vergil continued, frowning even more when Jester derisively dropped Kalina Ann—an act that she didn't particularly appreciate, given how much she had _paid_ for it. "Now leave!" he shouted, charging, sword drawn and ready to slice Jester in half. Demon or not, she hoped he succeeded; for some reason she would prefer to fight both white-haired demons instead of being in the same room as Jester.

She nearly gasped when Jester stopped Vergil's katana between his hands, the blade only inches away from his long, pointed nose. Vergil made a small, vulnerable sound of disbelief; she noticed Red watching the scene with a horrified look on his face.

"Zowie, that was close!" Jester said, his voice light and careless as Vergil attempted to free his sword from the clown's hands. "But you've taken quite a trouncing today, haven't you, _Vergil_?" Jester lifted one hand and placed it higher up on the blade, pushing it aside as if the white-haired demon weren't exerting all of his strength into forcing it down at him. "You could've chopped me into confetti by now if you were in tip-top condition."

"Damn you," Vergil hissed, looking a little frustrated and desperate. She suspected it was because Jester was _right_: Vergil was simply too tired to be an effective fighter.

"You have lost..." Jester added, only it wasn't Jester. The voice was familiar and unfamiliar at the same time, belonging to a man who she had watched die and mourned and attempted to avenge. Someone who shouldn't have been alive anymore, and she wasn't sure if she would be upset or relieved to find out that he was still alive. She stared at the floor, stomach churning with horror, and refused to look up, not even when she heard Vergil slide across the floor with a pained grunt. "...because you have underestimated humans."

She looked up and saw her father where Jester had been standing.

The walls felt like they were closing in, the air becoming heavier and harder to breathe. She couldn't look elsewhere, even though she wanted to turn away and run and never come back to this horrible place. She felt like the girl she had been when she learned about her mother's death, slumping over while holding the phone to her ear as everything caved in. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she felt rage building up as well, but with everything else swirling around inside her she was incapable of going much other than ask, in a voice that was smaller than her own: "What's going on?"

"Good girl," her father said, turning his head towards her. He was, again, the demon that he had been when she had tossed her off of the tower, and not the scared man whose eyes she had watched as he lay dying. "Pure and innocent ... just like your mother."

At the mention of her mother, she felt the rage build again, and she drew one of her guns from its holster. "You bastard!" she shouted, but immediately realized that her father was no longer where he once stood. Before she could even process it, she felt a thin, clawed hand grab her by the back of her head, and yanking back painfully.

Jester... Was _that_ her father's demon form? Was he really a demon now?

"It's time for your spanking, my dear!" he exclaimed, his long red nails scratching her forehead.

She tried bringing her gun up to shoot him in the face, but as soon as she did he brought her head to the floor, yanked it up, and then slammed it back down. Everything exploded into red and she squeezed her eyes shut so that the tears that were building didn't spill. She didn't want to give him the satisfaction of knowing that she was crying. Not again.

"You want to know why the spell didn't break, hmm, Vergil?" she faintly heard Jester ask as he let go of her head. That pressure was gone, at least, but it didn't do that much to relieve the pain that was shooting into her forehead and down to her eyes. "You have the two amulets and Sparda's blood. You had everything you needed to unleash the evil!"

"I told you before," she heard Red say, and she couldn't be happier to hear someone _else's_ voice. Her father's monologue was starting to drive her crazy. "I don't like anybody who has a bigger mouth than mine."

There was a pause, and suddenly she heard gunfire. She guessed it was Red—neither Vergil nor Jester had guns—but he kept on missing, despite his continued fire.

"You are wounded and weak," Jester taunted. "Even I can do..."

There was a pause, a cry of surprise, and then a loud crunch of impact at the same time as a grunt of extreme pain. She opened her eyes, ignoring the stars in her vision, and saw Jester standing on top of Red's face, arms raised in victory. "...this to you!" he finished, just as Red's limbs came crashing to the ground.

Jester laughed, leaping off of Red's face so that the white-haired demon could turn onto his side, blood dripping out of what must have been a broken nose. They met eyes, briefly, before she looked back down at the floor as she tried to push herself up. This was supposed to be _her_ fight—_her_ chance to kill her father, who clearly was more devious than she had originally given him credit for. He had completely fooled her, playing on her previous affections for whatever purpose he had in mind. Something about "unleashing the evil?" She wanted to get up and stop him, but was unable to as her head continued to throb.

"Two amulets ... a set of Sparda's blood," her father—not Jester anymore—continued, and she could see his feet approaching her. "Now I need one more key." He reached down, pale fingers wrapping around _her_ missile launcher and lifting it before the feet continued in her direction. She squirmed uncomfortably, willing herself to stand but finding the action incredibly difficult and painful. "He sacrificed two things to suppress the tremendous force of this tower: his own Devil's blood, and a mortal priestess."

She almost knew it was coming before it happened—it was too convenient, almost too clichéd. But the sensation of the bayonet suddenly cutting into the back of her thigh was as surprising as it would have been if she hadn't guessed what would happen, the metal cold as it tore through warm blood and muscle until it hit bone. She attempted to stifle the cry that she made at the impact without much success, but at this point the pain was too distracting and she lowered her head to the floor, shuddering as she did so. Any attempts to move only made the wound open more, so she stilled herself, not bothering to suppress the little pained noises that were involuntarily escaping from her throat. She was effectively trapped.

Stabbed by her own weapon. What were the odds?

"I needed you," her father continued, his voice low and dangerous, "in whose body flows the same blood as the sacrificed woman. His spell cannot be undone without your blood!"

Was that why he had tried to kill her mother? Because he needed her blood for some stupid spell? Had he ever even loved her and her mother, or had he just been using them to get closer to his goal of becoming a demon or whatever the fuck it was he had planned? She was questioning everything now—her relationship with her father, his attempts to share his interests with her, her entire _childhood_—and she hated it. How _dare_ he use them. How _dare_ he do that to his _family_. He had _no right_.

"It was quite a ride you know!" her father exclaimed, having transformed into Jester at some point while she was thinking. He swiftly pulled Kalina Ann from her leg, and she cried out in pain, trying to ignore the sudden lightheadedness now that her leg was bleeding _more_. "If any of your had died before getting here," he continued, "our little plan would have gone to waste! Therefore, my job was to make you battle each other in order to weaken you. But at the same time, I had to guide you here and make sure that you were kept alive. I even went so far as dressing like a complete idiot!"

Jester laughed, and she gritted her teeth, feeling her energy return to her even as the blood drained. She didn't look up at him, but was aware of his teal and mahogany eyes locked on her. "It's time for bed, Mary," he added, and she gritted her teeth even more at the repeated use of her old name. "You can visit your dear mother."

Her vision went red again as he started cackling maniacally, and in a fit of rage and adrenaline, she kicked her leg out to snag Kalina Ann from the clown's grasp and spinning to a standing position. She was soon standing, missile launcher pointed at her father, and smirking at the surprised gasp that the clown made when he realized what had just happened.

"Try me," she said.

She noticed Vergil and Red come up right behind her father, and she was never happier to see a pair of demons in her entire _life_. Their swords were crossed behind Jester's neck—between them and her bayonet, there was no way for him to escape.

"It's time for the clown to bow out, Arkham," Vergil snarled.

"Dude, the show's over!" Red added, and she couldn't help but think that he was just trying to sound cool and powerful in front of them. Ordinarily she might have rolled her eyes at him, but the stakes were far too high for her to get distracted like that.

"Impressive," her father said, and she realized that the man had once again transformed without her noticing. It was as if he couldn't decide which personality he should adopt under these circumstances, and to be honest, she wasn't sure which was more terrifying: the deranged clown or the corrupted man. "I expected nothing less from the Devil's descendants. But aren't you forgetting something, Vergil?" Her father paused, as if to give Vergil the opportunity to answer. He didn't. "The spell is broken. What do you think will happen next?"

She heard a slight rumbling, and the sound of stone sliding against stone. She frowned, hoping that nobody would notice that her hands were beginning to shake, though whether it was from fear or blood loss she wasn't sure herself.

"Let's welcome chaos!" her father whispered, and they did just that.

Everything shifted: the floor started shaking, the air turned red with something, and a cold breeze swept down to meet them, as if the tower were opening up. She was compelled to do something to stop whatever was going on, and given the fact that her father seemed to have been the one to start this, she stabbed Kalina Ann forward, hoping to skewer him. Her father managed to dodge it completely, and her bayonet instead met Red and Vergil's swords, the two demons having been compelled to do the same. She felt her legs being kicked out from under her—her _father_, she realized—and soon felt the two demons flying into her before all three of them went careening off the edge of the platform, which had apparently started rising since the sudden change in the room.

She landed with another painful thud, noticing that she was apart from the other two. Ignoring the screaming in her thigh, she stood, looking up in horror as her father continued rising on the platform, arms spread in a gesture of acceptance and victory.

"Just sit and wait!" he shouted, voice somehow rising above the cacophony of stone grating against stone. She had trouble seeing him as he rose farther and farther up, so she took a few steps back, watching him in horror and anger. "Wait for the birth of a new God! I shall take over the power of Sparda!"

Just like that, the floor broke underneath her—not slowly, so she could register each physiological response to the act of falling, but quickly and violently. She froze as she started falling, but soon felt a hand reach out and tightly grab her wrist, causing her to yelp in pain and surprise. Looking up, she saw—

—him again. Red, as she had taken to calling him. Only this time, rather than looking cocky and taking the opportunity to stare down her shirt or something, he was looking at her with relief, as if he were _glad_ that he had saved her. Why, so he could eat her later?

Didn't demons ... she didn't know ... _eat_ humans or something?

As bitchy as she wanted to be, she didn't seem to have the heart. Maybe it was just because her entire perception of the world had been turned upside down _again, _but she couldn't actually think anything negative about the demon. After all, he had just saved her. Again. She couldn't understand why this demon seemed so intent on saving her, because if he had wanted to eat her or something he had already had plenty of opportunities. Was it some patronizing "I'm a demon and you're a human, so you should get out of here" kind of thing? As appropriate of an answer as that seemed, particularly in light of his behavior so far, she still didn't understand why a demon would want to save her in the first place. A human.

She could tell from the way he was staring at her that this was something different. The look reminded her of the concerned looks that David had given her, that her friends had given her, that her teachers and the administration and even her lawyers had given her—similar in nature to, "What are you doing to yourself?" but his was more along the lines of "What else can I do?" Moreover, there seemed to be a trace of confusion laced in there as well, as if he were confused as well, wondering what the hell he was doing worrying about some human teenager. It _definitely_ wasn't as condescending as his earlier looks had been, but more sincere. It was strange, and she wasn't entirely sure how she felt about it.

It was as if he were offering his protection, as if she were _actually_ able to trust him.

She felt the blood from her wound run down her leg, a slower trickle than it had been earlier but enough for her to know that the wound was still open. Her sock had thankfully caught much of the blood, preventing it from leaking to the inside of her shoe for her foot to constantly feel as she walked. Still, the blood had gotten everywhere, sticking to her shirt and skirt and skin, and probably even a little bit in her hair, since there was a lock that insisted on sticking to her neck so stubbornly. She would need to clean the wound soon before any dirt got in it, and wrap it to stop the bleeding. Apparently she had to climb all the way to the top of the tower now, if she was going to kill her father and settle this once and for all.

She repressed a sigh as the sound of her father's laughter faded away to a mere whisper.

"Grab my other hand," the demon in red instructed, reaching down with his other hand.

She had _wanted_ to do this by herself—no interference from stupid demons or anything. Hadn't she proven to him that she didn't need his help or protection? She had half a mind to pull out her gun and shoot him again, see if he would drop her like last time. That would show him. Maybe she was bleeding and beaten, and more than a little bit emotionally thrown for a loop, but she didn't need his help. She didn't _want_ his help.

She grabbed his hand anyway.


	4. Dante

...I'm just going to start doing reviewer responses, because they seem like a lot of fun to me!

**zenbon zakura:** All of them do a lot of falling, I noticed: all three of them off of that platform during the ritual; Vergil down that hole and into Hell; Arkham out of the portal; Lady off of the tower when Arkham chucks her off; Dante flat out JUMPS... I guess when you're dealing with this huge monolith, the best plot device is just for them to fall!

**KuteInsanity:** Wow, thank you so much! It's actually been so interesting for me to go back and write all of this—this may sound weird, but I actually only had a _sense_ of what Lady was thinking for much of _PoT_, enough to write her reactions but never enough to say for sure what she thought of Dante. Finally going back and writing her out has been very fulfilling, as until the later chapters she never really "talked" to me per se. I'm glad you're enjoying it too!

**Angelforver06:** Thank you! And, as requested, a new chapter!

**PinkPriestess:** Lol well you were the 100th! Got your message, by the way, and I've already done a bit of brainstorming as to what I want to do. Please feel free to message me again if you want to add onto your original ideas, and I'll message you if I have any questions or thoughts!

**Anonymous:** This chapter is Dante and Lady in the library. I hadn't originally planned on writing Lady killing Arkham, but it's definitely not too late for me to write, if you'd like to see it...! (Come to think of it, in line with another request, I probably should, even if it's just short...) I actually have gotten some requests—mainly earlier on, when I first asked what people would want to see. Although I probably should remind people...

**HEY EVERYONE!** If there's something you want to see, **PLEASE LET ME KNOW!** I won't be doubling back to older material once I've passed it, so speak up now!

On that note, here is Dante and Lady in the library, as requested by ... I can only find the request by Anonymous, but I think someone else also might have asked me for this one... Either way, I think this is something you all want to see. ;)

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case I.3) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

* * *

**Ephemerality**

_3: Dante_

(corresponds to a moment within I.3: Knights and Ladies)

He was going to kill her. She knew that he had the ability, and he was finally going to use it.

A part of her had known from the get-go that seriously facing him, was nearly suicide—the only thing that seemed to have an effect on him was exhaustion, and the only thing that exhausted him was fighting Vergil—but she hadn't had any choice. If he was going to stand in her way, tell her that she couldn't do it because she was a human and therefore_ weak_, then she would have to try to prove to him that she _could_ be strong.

Again. She was a little tired of having to prove this to him.

When they had first started fighting in the library, she had sensed the familiar restraint: he was refusing to do anything to really hurt her in favor of messing with her. It reminded her of their fight in front of her father's not-corpse, when he had just held her off and heard her out rather than really fighting her. While it had been a little bit appropriate there, in hindsight—she had really needed to vent, and had been able to take out her frustrations on him—it had been frustrating as hell when she had actually challenged him to a _real_ fight, to the death, and the most threatening thing he had done was put his gun to her neck and flirted with her. It wasn't a real fight, no matter how many grenades she threw.

Mere minutes later, though, she missed it when he wasn't taking her seriously, because holy shit that sword was scary. She was trapped in a pose much like the one that Vergil had trapped her in earlier, with Red bearing his sword down on Kalina Ann. Despite being about equal in size and likely in strength, Red's sword was a lot heavier, so she felt the weight of him pushing down more than she had with Vergil. Then he grinned down at her, while the look that was nowhere near as animalistic as the looks that he had worn during his earlier fight with the other demon, a part of her still missed the idea of him being a flirty goofball, purposefully harmless.

Well. At least he was taking her seriously now.

She frowned and pushed back, and he must have been putting a lot of his weight into the sword because he staggered back a bit. Taking opportunity of his loss of balance, she ran a few feet away and turned back around to face him, resting Kalina Ann on the floor and firing a few missiles at once. It was a _completely_ desperate move, but she was tired, her leg was aching, and she was hoping that _one_ of them would hit. Maybe he could survive a gunshot wound, but would his arm grow back if it got blown off?

To her endless dismay, he jumped up and out of sight. Her eyes darted around in a quick search for her opponent, who suddenly appeared behind her, firmly placing his hands on her shoulders and saying, a smile in his voice: "Gotcha."

This was a joke. It was an absolute joke. Was he, or was he not taking her seriously? One second he was trying to kill her with that big fucking sword of his, the next he was playing cat and mouse with her. This was _not_ a fight; it was a game, and she was losing.

He must have been unsure of how to react to her pause, because he tightened his grip on her shoulder, as if to remind her that he was there and it was her move. There was something almost soothing about the action, as if he were trying to massage her. She purposefully remained tense, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of knowing that he had the advantage, even though they both knew that he did at that point. Instead, she spun out of his grip, swung Kalina Ann back over her shoulder, and pulled out her last six grenades which she haphazardly threw at his feet. He jumped up and out of the way, kick-jumping off the bookshelves to stay in the air as she threw the last few grenades she had at him with surprisingly poor aim. Her hand instinctively went to her pocket as if she had more grenades, which on top of being a completely useless gesture showed him that she didn't have any left. He dropped down, stalking forward with an unintimidated, almost _predatory_ look.

Shit. This was it; she was dead. She pulled out her gun and fired—of course the bullets wouldn't have done much against him anyway, but if getting him in the face meant buying her enough time to get away, then it was the best possible plan against this nearly unstoppable demon. But as with the grenades moments earlier she was a disastrous shot, the bullets uselessly whizzing by him as he continued forward, unflinching. As soon as the clip emptied she reached for another, beginning to reload but dropping both clip and gun in the process. She had one gun left—and a lot of ammo as well, but there was no way she was going to wait around anymore. She turned on her heel and fled, figuring that the best solution was to make for the exit and continue her path up the tower until she reached her father. Maybe she could lose the demon in red in some corridor, and he would leave her alone until she was prepared to face him again. You know. _Eventually_.

He must have figured out her plan, because just as she was about to get to the door, he appeared in front of her with an almost disappointed look on his face. Well, Red, she was _sorry_ she couldn't put up a good enough fight, but she was kind of running out of options and a little more than scared out of her wits. She didn't want to waste any more missiles, particularly at such a short range, so her other gun, which was thankfully fully loaded, was all she had at the moment, She pulled it out, firing a few shots as he backed her straight into the wall, and just like before her hands shook so much that the bullets uselessly flew past him.

Just as she started inwardly scolding herself for missing point-blank _again_, she heard the clicking of the empty barrel. She had other clips, so she _could_ have reloaded, but something in her was giving up, wanting to surrender to this damn demon's mercy because she really didn't have it in her anymore. The most she could do was look away, face twisted in defeat, as she continued fruitlessly pulling the trigger on her empty gun, finding the clicking to be oddly comforting.

She didn't have the energy to resist when he stopped right in front of her, pushing her gun hand away and allowing it to fall limply to her side. To her great surprise she also didn't resist when he rested on hand on the wall next to her head, standing close with one leg intentionally or unintentionally making its way between hers. He lowered his head slightly, the look on his face unreadable despite how close it was, and said with a voice that was so strangely gentle that she almost thought it wasn't him: "I'll take care of him."

She loosened slightly, eyes scanning his face briefly, trying to read for signs of ... well, _anything_. He seemed sincere enough, but there was something that was obviously sexual in what he was doing that kind of countervailed the reassurance he was trying to convey. It was as if he expected something from her, in that moment—whatever it was, she had no idea. A concession? A thank you?

A kiss?

She nearly slapped herself—or him—for letting that thought slip into her head. Where had it come from? Besides, he was a _demon_. It was _wrong. _

Still, she had to admit that had it been anyone else—_anyone—_she would have found the situation incredibly romantic and slightly exciting. She couldn't _believe_ that she was thinking about this, but the proximity of their sweat-drenched bodies, his toned, bare chest in plain sight, his sharp blue eyes... She could even _smell_ him at this distance: good aftershave mixed with sweat and the slight coppery tang of blood and something otherworldly. Dear Lord in heaven it looked like it belonged on the cover of a romance novel, or in an incredibly tense, sexy scene between the two protagonists of some action-adventure film, right before a climactic make out session. And something about him made her think that he was probably a pretty good kisser, though she wasn't quite sure what.

Her mother had always told her that guys like him—the handsome, flirty machos—were the ones to look out for. They were the ones who used girls and cast them away, and no matter how attractive or charming they were, they were always up to no good. That was why Kalina Ann had always liked David, who was far too normal to be dishonest.

She tensed at the fact that the memory had just run through her head. That must have been it: she was just sexually frustrated. She had broken up with David, or the other way around, or maybe it had been mutual, a little less than a year ago, when he had finally decided that he couldn't put up with her distance anymore and she had finally decided that she was sick of him trying to "talk" about it. As glad as she was that she was free of him—and that was a painful thought: she was _free_ of the person who had tried, on a personal level, to keep her sane and connected to the world after the sudden tragedy of her mother's death and father's disappearance—she had just been starting to enjoy sex with him, as infrequent as it had become by the end. So that must have been it. It was just ... sexual frustration, because she hadn't gotten any in a while.

But David was white bread, almost bland at times, even during fits of passion. Red here—well, not that she would ever do anything with him _ever, but in an improbable, alternate universe where the act was possible—_

—oh, no way. She was not thinking about this anymore—

—sudden, impulsive, _passionate_—

—he was leaning in, eyes locked with her before slowly drifting shut—

She turned her head away, making a small noise of protest, making a point not to look up at him so as to avoid the look on his face, whatever it ended up being. She felt a little bit disgusted at herself: he was a _demon_. Inhuman. Only good when he was dead. Humans and demons didn't mesh, not only because they were different species, but because demons' instincts were to kill and hurt and destroy. That wasn't safe—in fact, it was pretty sickening. It wasn't to say that humans were perfect and that they didn't also kill for fun, but they were certainly better than demons.

Red pushed himself away from the wall, and she found it a lot easier to reject him when his presence wasn't engulfing hers. Still, there was something stiff about his gait as he walked away from her that threw her for a loop, made her wonder what kind of human emotions demons could feel, if he wasn't just faking it. She had witnessed the flirting, the annoyance, the rage, and the fear, but then there had also been that sincerity that she had briefly seen once or twice. Was that hurt? She didn't understand what he felt, _how_ he felt, how it was _possible_ for him to feel, and it made her confused and vulnerable and, perhaps most of all, _curious_.

"Why do you care so much?" she asked, stepping away from the wall. She needed to know; there must have been a reason why he had been trying to protect her this entire time, why he was even _here_ in the first place. The idea of them being on the same side—that the demon in red was trying to _stop_ the demonic power that the tower was holding back from being unleashed, and not trying to help it to happen or even take the power for himself—was unfathomable to her, and yet it appeared to be true. He needed to stop her father just as much as she did, and she couldn't understand why.

His foot caught on the floor, slowing him to a stop. He stood for a moment, obviously in thought, before turning and answering: "This whole business started with my father sealing the entrance between two worlds." He started walking towards her again, his metaphorical tail no longer between his legs as he gestured widely. "And now, my brother is trying to break that spell and turn everything into demonville." She frowned. If Vergil was his brother and the Sparda of legend his _father_, then— "This is my family matter too."

She felt her eyes widened as it all occurred to her. Red was as tied to this tower—and the fate of the world—as she was. After all, it had been his brother who had enabled her father to seize the tower; his blood, like hers, that had helped to unleash the tower; his father's legacy at stake. They both _needed_ to stop this ritual from being completed, for reasons that were as selfish as they were selfless. They were the same, in that sense.

The same.

He turned away from her, and continued: "Quite frankly, at first, I didn't give a damn." He turned over his shoulder to look at her again, his gaze rich with what appeared to be _thanks_. "But because of _you_, I know what's important now. I know what I need to do."

He didn't say anything, and she didn't feel the need to respond, so they just watched each other. It was almost a little touching—like she had taught him a little bit of humanity. But maybe it was something he had always had, even though he was a demon, as strange as it seemed. Believe it or not, she felt incredibly guilty for treating him the way she had treated him, even if he was just a demon. He deserved at least a little more respect and credit than she had given him.

Then he nodded, and turned to walk away.

"Wait!" she called out from behind him, though she wasn't sure why she wanted him to stay for a little while longer. Maybe she just needed to apologize to him, or do _something_ to help. If she was going to accept his help and let everything rest in _his_ hands, then she needed to contribute in some way. She was not the kind of person to sit around and wait for people to do things for her, even though that was pretty much what she was about to do.

"Trust me!" Red exclaimed, turning to face her with arms out and voice surprisingly lighthearted. He took a step forward, everything about him _radiating_ his need for her to trust him. "I'll make things right for you. That's what _my_ soul is telling me to do."

His stress of _my_ reminded her of her own words earlier, and while a part of her was still asking herself if demons had souls in the first place, she instead nodded and removed Kalina Ann from her shoulder, holding it out in front of her. "Use this."

He gave her a strange look, probably wondering if she _seriously_ wanted to hand off one of her only lines of defense in a demon-infested tower. It was crazy, she had to admit, but if she couldn't do it herself then she wanted Kalina Ann to be a part of his battles, helping to make things right. Throwing his hesitation aside, he joked, as he started to reach for the missile launcher: "How much is it going to cost me?"

Well, she had been planning to give it to him for free, but now that he mentioned it, she could get something else out of this. She pulled Kalina Ann just out of his reach, trying not to smirk at the surprised look on his face. This was her opportunity to get any information she wanted, and when she thought about it, there was just one thing she wanted to know. "You can give me your name," she offered. Maybe it wasn't particularly pressing, but she at least wanted a real name for this demon, something to replace the nicknames she had given him over the night. If anything, it would give her a name to remember when she killed him.

He paused in consideration—if he was surprised by her question, he didn't show it—before answering: "Dante."

Dante. What a strange name. It was otherworldly and suited him completely, particularly the way he said it, with that hint of arrogance. She smiled, a little surprised that she was smiling so sincerely in the first place over something so trivial, particularly when her smiles were now so few and far between.

She held out Kalina Ann, barely resisting the urge to snatch it back from him just as he grabbed it. Dante—hah, Dante—tested the weight of the missile launcher, observing it before swinging it over his shoulder. He shot her a meaningful look, and she suddenly felt as though he were trying to thank her, even though he wasn't saying it out loud. And with that, he turned to walk away, carrying with him not only her missile launcher, but also everything that she held important. He was going to solve everything for her. He promised.

Her mother had always told her that guys like him were the ones to look out for, that they couldn't be _trusted_—

"Dante," she said, for some reason enjoying the sound of his name. He turned to face her, face strong and unreadable, like a valiant knight about to charge off to battle. "Please, free my father."

"I will," he promised, "Lady."

He turned completely, and she didn't have the energy to stop him this time. She leaned against the bookshelf and slid down, feeling the spines of ancient demonic books brush against her back before she hit the floor with a surprising thud. Her limbs melted and she curled into herself, not sure whether she should succumb to her overwhelming sense of vulnerability and cry, or steel herself with determination.

When all this was over and her father was dead, she would either kill Dante or leave and never see him again. Or die trying.


	5. Lady

Responses! I'm having way too much fun with these. Please, feel free to ask me questions, whatever! And please, make requests for chapters! As much of a "plan" as I already have, I'm perfectly willing to add chapters based on what you like to see, slash have already been reexamining my plan based on the requests I've gotten, so please please please tell me what you want to see!

**Pink Priestess:** I'm glad you enjoyed it! :)

**KuteInsanity:** I actually struggled with how experienced Lady was going to be, if only because of her namesake. (You know, the whole DMC is based off of _The Divine Comedy_ so Lady/Mary actually corresponds to _la Madonna_ thing) Making Lady more sexually experienced was a way of complicating her earlier relationship with Dante, particularly when he makes the move on her in the library. She recognizes the sexual attraction and understands what she could be getting herself into, which makes it a little more powerful when she turns her head away, at least in terms of what I'm going for with this story. It ended up not just being: "That demon tried to kiss me," but instead: "A demon tried to kiss me and I almost let him," which kind of sets the stage for the complications in their relationship over the rest of the story.

**Anonymous:** It is a bit short, but that's kind of what I had in mind for _Ephemerality_: kind of uneven in terms of individual chapter lengths because the moments could be the other sides of scenes or tiny little details that I built into the story. They'll never be_ that_ short—I know how to ramble, haha—but they'll vary in length depending on how much I'm covering in how big of a space. There will be moments that are shorter than this (or, at least, I can think of a few that should be pretty short and sweet), and there will definitely be moments that are a lot longer, as long as _PoT_ chapters. It all depends.

Anyway, folks, I have one more chapter planned for the "Longest Night" section before I finish and post the next chapter of _The Passage of Time_! I say one because there's only one other moment that I think you guys would want to see, and what I have planned will incorporate that. I'm actually breaking my "ONE MOMENT A CHAPTER! DX" rule in order to combine those two moments, since they're essentially related. Besides, I don't want to keep you guys waiting with _PoT_ that much longer—poor Dante, about to start _DMC2_...

Meanwhile, here's "Lady kills Arkham/chooses her name," as requested by hinatalover445 and Anonymous! (And again, I apologize if I forgot anyone here... I've started writing down who requested the chapters, but I always feel like I'm leaving out someone who made a request a while back.)

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case I.4) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

* * *

**Ephemerality**

_4: Lady_

(corresponds to a moment hidden amidst the events of I.4: Shared Mission)

She was proud of herself for reaching the top of Temen-ni-gru—despite having spent all night exploring the tower, she hadn't made it too far up before being chucked off the edge by her father, at which point she had spent a great deal of time exploring the lower levels. Now she had finally made it to the top level of the tower, and while she wasn't particularly _glad_ to see the glowing portal hovering menacingly above her, bright against the dark clouds of the night, she was proud of herself for making it this far, particularly with her bad leg. It was more of a dull ache by this point anyway, so long as she didn't put any weight on it, but she knew that it'd have to get stitched together at some point soon. Maybe she had been able to ignore the other scratches she had gotten, but this wound was deep, and not just metaphorically.

She recognized the platform as soon as she stepped onto it: dark stone coursed with blood red lines. The space was enclosed by seven massive carved bells, each—if she was guessing correctly—corresponding to the seven deadly sins, or more aptly the seven Hells they had been encountering all this time. She had seen the statues elsewhere in the tower, and while it was certainly surprising to see them up here at the top, she knew that it was because the interior of the tower had been pretty much razed as the platform had risen. She had spent much of her climb to the top scaling the exterior wall, but what she _had_ seen of the inside looked completely destroyed.

It was almost a shame. Temen-ni-gru was somewhat of an architectural marvel, something that she would appreciate more if it weren't a demonic monolith.

Dante had clearly already passed this point, probably having gone through the portal and up to the demon world to deal with her father. She was a little bit grateful that he wasn't here, as he probably would have started ranting about the fact that she was injured so why was she moving when he could take care of it for her? Her "excuse" had been that she had seen Vergil slip past her in the library, following the path that Dante had already taken, and she wanted to investigate. In reality, she was just too impatient to sit still and wait for everything to be solved around her. At the very least, she had needed to make it to the top, if not also find her father and fire a few rounds at him, even if he was already dead. She wanted to contribute.

The portal suddenly flashed a brighter red and she noticed a figure falling from above. She took a few steps back, her eyes following the man—it was definitely a man—as he landed on the top of the tower with an unpleasant-sounding thump. She grinned a little with morbid delight, noticing the man's bald head and grayish skin, and the thick red trail of blood that followed him as he started crawling, muttering to himself like the madman that he was.

As he continued crawling forward she walked closer to him, trying to walk evenly despite the pain shooting up her injured leg. Her hand reached for her gun, now reloaded, and trained it on his head even as she continued her slow, purposeful steps. A few more steps and she was standing right in front of him, effectively cutting off his path.

It was a dream come true. She wouldn't make the same mistake this time.

"What a surprise," she coolly said, completely enjoying the angry and pained expression on his face as he raised his head to look at her, eyes widening in slight disbelief. There was a little bit of blood on the corner of his mouth—she was more than willing to kick it off for him. "Here I was looking for you and, lo and behold, you come to me."

"Mary..." her father started, his voice an angry whisper.

"Don't ever call me that again," she threatened, gun still pointed at him, voice barely hiding the rage that she felt at hearing that sick fuck use her old name. "My mother was the only one who could say my name." And her mother was dead, so there was nobody left who really had the right to use that name. People might try, but they were _wrong_.

"Wait, please!" her father started, perhaps interpreting from her voice and stance that she was about to pull the trigger. Something about his voice sounded almost light again, like the voice that he used to have before all of this started. "Do you really want to shoot me? _Can_ you shoot me, your own father?"

She didn't answer, instead maintaining her position. She wanted to say that she could, she _could_ do it, but a part of her wasn't so sure anymore. Every time she looked at him, no matter how disgusting he seemed to her, she always saw a little sliver of her real father, and wished that she could still have the life that she used to have, no matter how late it was.

"What have I done wrong?" he suddenly shouted, which jarred her slightly, but she didn't show it. "Even the heroic Sparda sacrificed a woman so that _he_ could become a legend! I wished to be a _god_!" His face was twisted in a malicious scowl, voice a loud growl, almost as if he were about to transform into some monster and rip her to shreds. Her only comfort was the fact that he was seriously wounded—since, unlike Dante, he couldn't immediately heal his wounds, he was confined to the floor. "And I sacrificed one _miserable_ human being for that reason. That is all! Was that really _so_ awful?"

She bristled. _Yes_, it was really so awful, because that miserable human being was her _mother_ and his _wife_, and that they had once been a happy human family together, free of this demonic bullshit except through the fantastical, seemingly improbable stories he would tell her in his study, a large, ancient-looking book in front of them. Yes, Sparda had sacrificed a woman to benefit everyone—a story that she remembered from long ago, and that in hindsight seemed improbable, except for the fact that the white-haired idiot who said he was Sparda's son seemed to have inherited his father's desire to protect humanity. Her father had been acting out of his own selfish desires for _godhood_, _immortality_, _ultimate power_, _all_ things that he had no business having and no right to touch, _especially_ when it came at such a cost.

"I have some unfinished business to take care of," her father finished, voice quieter and calmer again, but retaining its menacing edge. "Help me, Mary."

Mary? That was the girl who had been normal and innocent, who had nice friends and a great boyfriend and loved her family. Mary, who knew about demons but had learned to dismiss them as fairy tales that her father would tell her so they could spend time together. Mary, who had never had to talk to lawyers or manage her estate or really be responsible for her life, because there were people who could sit there and hold her hand and make her feel better if she was worried about the future; who had never gotten into a fight or fired a gun or ridden a motorcycle; and who had actually perhaps dreamed of excitement and danger in her nice, peaceful life.

"Mary died a long time ago," she said, voice slow and even. Even if her mother were still alive, she wouldn't be able to use the name Mary, because Mary wasn't Mary anymore. Yet again, if her mother were still alive, it would mean that none of this would have happened. When her mother had died, so did Mary, leaving behind ... whoever she was.

Dante had spent half of the night asking for her name, and she still didn't have an answer for him. After he had come ripping out of that Leviathan's eyeball, covered in blood, that she had told him that she had no name, and so he could call her whatever he wanted to call her. He hadn't really responded, dismissively calling her a lady before leaping gracefully through the air and out of the fray, leaving her to battle her own demons, as it were. He had called her Mary when her father had used it, and she had angrily shut him down, because Mary _wasn't_ her name. Not anymore, anyway.

_So you really weren't kidding when you said you had no name._

It wasn't that she didn't want a name, it's that she hadn't found it yet. Granted, she hadn't spent time thinking of who she _would_ be as she had insisting that she had changed, but that didn't change the fact that she was still lost. What had Mary left behind? A scarred body, a cracked mind, and a desire to be anything but the person that she was before.

_What'll I call you when I want to remember you?_

By the time she finally found out _his_ name, Dante had seemed to have given her a nickname of her own, recycled from his earlier dismissal. There was something oddly fitting about the name, perhaps because it had been born from her new self and not from the Mary she had once been. She wasn't young, innocent Mary anymore, she was a hardened ... _Lady_.

"My name is _Lady_."

Her father made a slight face, as if he were questioning the new name she had given herself. She supposed that he had every reason to be vexed, having chosen that name himself at her birth. His words had named Mary, and then his actions had undone her. She supposed she didn't care anymore. Her father was dead _too_, and the man he had become would soon join him.

"Goodbye, father," she added, bringing her other hand to her gun with a sense of finality.

His eyes had widened, and he barely had the chance to cry: "No!" to stop her when her first shot rang out. That first bullet had done it, ripping straight through his skull, but that one bullet—the one that for her mother, that had avenged her death—wasn't enough. Another joined it—this one for Mary—then another—for everyone who had been killed or nearly killed—then _another_—for the memory of the real Jonathan Arkham—then _another_—

There was no fifth: she was out of bullets. She was once again left with the lonely clicking of an empty chamber, and the bloody, almost unrecognizable corpse of her father Arkham.

She stumbled back, gun still aimed at her father's head as she fell to the floor, ignoring the sharp pain in her leg as she released heavy, disbelieving breaths. He was gone. He was really dead. She had _killed_ him—_her_, not Dante. She had gotten her revenge.

A soft laugh erupted from her throat and built, leaving her laughing with her face tilted up at the night sky. It was all at once victorious and derisive: she laughed at the sky, the portal, her father, Vergil, Dante, herself, her name, the situation, her lawyers, her friend, her ex—she mocked everything that came to mind, gloating at the idea of her overcoming the overwhelming odds and achieving her seemingly impossible goals. Her father was _dead_, and she was going to walk away, not unscathed but certainly better off. It was over. She had _won_.

She was surprised when her laughter slowed and turned into soft sobbing, her eyes stinging with the onslaught of tears. She tilted her head to look down instead of at the glowing portal in the sky, watching as thick tears splattered to the floor, leaving little dark stains on the stone floor. "Here I thought I wasn't gonna cry," she said, supposing that it was because she missed her father now that he was dead, despite knowing that it was so much more than that.

Today she was sitting on top of a demonic tower, the fate of the world on her mind and her father's corpse at her feet, but where would she be tomorrow? Would she just have to turn back, go home, and resume her life now that she had made everything right again? That had been the plan, and the promise she had made to both the administrators at her school and her lawyers. She was an emancipated minor—she could do whatever she wanted, in theory, and if that meant completely disappearing from Mary's life to start a new one then so be it. But she had left unfinished business in her wake when she had hopped on her motorcycle and started chasing after her father, and she knew that the only way she would be _truly_ at peace was to make sure that Mary's life had no loose ends before she could go and enjoy her own, new life. Killing her father had been one of those steps, but there was still more to go.

She stood, and from the angry ache that _both_ of her legs had when she stood she realized that she had been sitting there for quite some time. She sighed and, with one last look at her father, started the long passage back down the tower. She knew what she had to—

—_Lady_ knew what she had to do next.


	6. Consequence

Responses! _Way_ too much fun. Talk to me, folks, and I will answer.

**hinatalover445:** I'm so glad you enjoyed it! And expect the next _PoT_ chapter veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeery soon... :)

**LadyMonotagari:** Thank you! Lady didn't do much during that scene—she was very controlled, until the part where she laugh-cries—which kind of leaves a lot of room for her inner monologue, since there's _so_ much at stake and _so_ much going on at that point. I'm so glad you think I nailed it! I actually didn't write the entire road scene with Dante due to length, since I really don't want to keep everyone waiting on that last, torturous _PoT_ chapter. There's also a lot going on _after_ that point that I want to cover, and to speed things along I'm condensing all of it into one chapter... There's just so much going on!

**Pink Priestess:** Oh, yay! I'm glad you enjoyed it! PS: Your giftfic is coming soon. :)

**Anonymous:** My secret? When I don't have anything to do at work, I write. :O I actually wrote most of this chapter at work, the day that I posted the previous one! This fast-paced posting trend will not continue into the academic year, although by that point I think the _PoT_-_Ephem_ duo will already be done, barring some horrible case of author's block—not that I think it'll happen!

**KuteInsanity:** That meeting with Dante is about half of the chapter—the other half is new stuff that's important for Lady's general development. Originally I was going to avoid it just because I didn't want to drag this out that much longer before getting to the new material/posting the new chapter of _PoT_, but I realized that I needed to visit that moment just to set the stage for later Dante and Lady interaction. And I really enjoyed writing Lady's memories of her past, so I'm glad you liked them!

Okay, everyone. This is the last chapter of _Ephemerality_ to treat with the events of "The Longest Night!" As I mentioned last time, I'm actually breaking my "ONE MOMENT A CHAPTER! DX" with this one just because I don't want you guys to have to wait any longer, but I ended up kind of liking the way that the two moments flowed into each other. So it all worked out! After this, well, it'll all be new material. Actually, _right_ after this I'm posting the next chapter of _The Passage of Time_, and then the giftfic for Pink Priestess! So stay tuned!

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case I.4) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

* * *

**Ephemerality**

_5: Consequence_

(corresponds to two moments at the end of and after I.4: Shared Mission)

Maybe _walking_ all the way home wasn't the best idea on her leg, especially given the fact that "home" was 800 miles away. But Lady would be damned if she let herself get coddled and pitied by Dante, just because he was a _demon_ and getting sliced up didn't do shit to him like it did to her.

She had to admit, though, it would be tempting to go back and rest at his place, if it hadn't been completely destroyed like everything else in this town. Even if it wasn't wherever he called home—assuming it wasn't some dark cave filled with human corpses, but at this point she could see that Dante, despite being a demon, was too nice and/or stupid to do anything to hurt a human, her father excluded—he actually lived in this city, and could help her find ... well, _anything_. But she had already told herself that she was getting her missile launcher and getting the fuck _out_, because she had no place milling around with that demon, as nice as he was being right now or not. The next time she would see him would be the time she would come back and kill him, this time equipped with something that would shut off that damn healing ability of his long enough to do him in.

It felt a little cruel, but it was her job. She was a demon hunter, he was a demon. He would eventually have to be a casualty, if it meant that nothing like _this_ could happen again. Meanwhile, he could continue to hunt and fight, if only because he was doing some of the work for her. She was only one person; she couldn't kill all of the demons _herself_.

That, and she felt like she kind of owed him for all of the help he had given her and how nice he had been to her. Her thank you was _not_ immediately figuring out the best way to kill him.

She needed to leave anyway. She had things to deal with back home.

"I mean, if you want to head back now, fine," Dante insisted, though proceeding with a bit of caution after that last glare she had just graced him with, "but I'm not going to let you go if you're gonna pass out on the road somewhere from blood loss or something."

"Thanks for the concern, but I'll be fine, thanks," Lady said, suddenly smiling at him. She had to admit, it _was_ a little bit endearing that he was trying so hard to look out for her, though it probably would have been even more endearing if he were a _human_ and not a demon holding a sword. As much as she liked doing things on her own and didn't like anyone's help, it was nice to have someone try to look out for her—nicer than it had been before, anyway. Maybe it was just because she had _just_ accomplished so much on her own that she could appreciate other people trying to give her a little support when most of the work was already done. For the sake of her pride, though, she always had the power to turn them down, already satisfied by the kindness of the gesture. "I'd be a crappy demon hunter if I didn't have the stamina."

A strange look crossed his face—almost one of surprise, which she hadn't expected. He was kind of funny that way, reacting to things that she might not have reacted to, in ways that she wouldn't have either. "You're going to keep on doing this?"

She frowned. Did he not think she could do it? Had she not just spent a night in a demonic tower, fighting demons? If he was underestimating her again, she was sick of it. "What, you think it's over now that my father is dead? I still have my mission. I'm going to make sure that every last demon is dead." She folded her arms, staring straight at him. Yes, that meant _him_ too. "As long as they're around, monsters like my father will continue to side with them, and I can't let that happen."

Dante sighed loudly, and she wondered if it was because he thought her conviction was _cute_. She'd _show_ him cute, if that was the case. "Well, I don't think you can take me now, seeing how tired you are," he said, and she nearly jumped. It was strange how casually he was talking about her attempts to kill him, as if they didn't matter. Had he been hunted before? "Why don't you save me for last? I'd like a few more years, at least." He grinned. "Tell you what: I'll help you out, and when we're done, you can shoot me until I'm dead. It might take a while, but you have a lot of bullets, don't you? I..." He trailed off, looking a little bit confused. "What? What's wrong?"

Lady almost jumped. Had she been making a face? If anything she was a bit confused by all of that, and more confused by the fact that he had proposed the same "kill me later" thing that she had already opted to carry out. It was as if they were on the same page, and that kind of scared her. "No, it's just..." she started, then opted to stop in favor of a wry smile and cryptic proposal. "How about we just cross that bridge when we get to it. Who knows? Maybe you can convince me not to kill you in the meantime." Unlikely, but ... well, it would work for now. Keep him guessing.

Of course, to maintain his player persona, he stepped forward and said: "I know a few ways to convince you, if you're interes—"

She immediately pulled out one of her handguns—she couldn't even remember if it was loaded, but what he didn't know wouldn't hurt him—and pressed it against the bridge of his nose. She almost started burning with embarrassment: he hadn't figured out what she had been thinking in the library, had he? If he did, well, he would use it against her forever. He would follow her around and remind her constantly that, for a split second, she had been willing to ignore the fact that he was a demon and perhaps maybe see what getting with him would be like. "The _reverse_ also applies," Lady threatened, hoping to stop _that_ train of thought before it got going.

Dante raised his hands in surrender, backing away slightly. It was nice to not have him in her personal space—whenever he was, she felt this strange sense of danger that she couldn't quite explain. It was probably the fact that he was a demon. "Right. We'll do it your way," he conceded.

"Good," Lady said, putting her gun back into its holster with a surprising amount of relief. "Glad we can agree."

She wasn't quite sure what to say next, and from the looks of it, neither did he. She supposed she would just have to get out of there, start the long journey home. From the top of the tower, it hadn't looked like _everything_ had been destroyed, so if she moved out of the city and into the suburbs she would be able to find some place to rest, some way of transporting herself, or something. It really was too bad that her bike had been destroyed, and not just because she had spent so much time and money tricking it out. She would just have to buy a new one. She had inheritance.

"Sure I can't convince you to stay for a while, at least?" Dante asked again, and as nice as the gesture continued to be, she was starting to get a little sick of it. "You're tired."

Oh great, now he was assuming things. Lady frowned. "I'm fi—"

"I'm just saying that because I'm pretty tired too, so you must be beat," he interrupted, smiling and taking a few steps forward. "Trust me, it takes a lot for me to admit that."

She smiled a little—the big scary demon had his moments of weakness as well, and it was interesting to see him admit them. It was also interesting to know that he _did_ eventually tire out, as she had seen when he fought Vergil. "I'll be fine," she said, deciding to not to be forceful when he really _was_ just trying to be nice to her.

Lady saw that Dante was standing in her personal space again, and it took all of her might not to push him away, particularly when he put his hand on her shoulder. She just had to keep on telling herself that he was trying to be nice; he didn't have that amatory smirk on his face, so it wasn't like he was going to lean in and kiss her or anything. He was just still doing that _nice_ thing that she didn't quite understand but kind of appreciated, even though she also wanted him to stop doing that and start treating her like the capable young woman that she was.

He stood, staring at her for a moment, before squeezing her shoulder lightly and saying: "Okay. Just don't say I never tried to do something nice for you."

"Don't worry," she wryly assured him, raising her eyebrow and tilting her head. "I've already counted that time you caught me when the floor broke out from under me."

"What, the other times I helped your ass didn't count?" he asked, frowning as he spoke.

Lady stiffened, annoyed that he would say that to her. Was he _trying_ to humiliate her? Just admitting that she was a little bit grateful was enough of a stretch for her, so she definitely wasn't going to fall to her knees before him and sing praises to him. That was _ridiculous_, and she would never stoop so low. Not for a demon—not even for a human. Never. "Do you want my respect or not?" she asked him, voice almost cold, watching him carefully for his reaction. It was funny that she was even _considering_ respecting him, but she guessed that it was for her own pride as well: if she thought the guy who had saved her a few times was an idiot, then she was lose respect for herself as well.

She guessed that she didn't respect herself all that much then.

"Yeah, I do, actually," Dante answered after a pause, his free hand grasping her other shoulder. They met eyes, and Lady got the impression that he was desperately trying to tell her something. What it was, she wasn't entirely sure, and she wasn't sure if she cared, either.

"Then settle for what you've got right now, before you ruined it," she warned. She glanced at his hands before looking back up at him, her own polite way of telling him to get the fuck off.

Dante dropped his hands and took a few steps back, his face incredibly unreadable. For someone who was so obvious, he was surprisingly difficult to understand. "Then come visit if you're ever in the area again."

That was something she _could_ do, she guessed, though that next visit might be the one when she kills him. "I'll keep it in mind," she said, readjusting Kalina Ann on her shoulder. She figured it was as good of a time as any to leave, and so turned over her shoulder and started making her way over the pile of rubble that enclosed the clearing they had been fighting in. The road back north was straight ahead—all she had to do was keep walking and never look back. "I'll be in touch," she added as she kept walking, not really sure if she was going to keep that promise but proud of herself for offering in the first place.

After a pause, Dante called out: "Are you sure you're—"

"I'm _fine_, Dante," she interrupted, waving her hand dismissively as she started her path down the pile of debris. He didn't say anything else, and she didn't feel the need to.

It took fifteen minutes of walking for her to wish that she actually _had_ taken up Dante's offer, if only because her leg was starting to kill her, but at this point it was too late to go back—not just because of her pride, but also because he would have already started his own trip home by that point, which was probably in the other direction since he hadn't offered to walk with her. Either way it was for the best: being around that demon was a little confusing. There was something different about him that she couldn't quite place, but that felt wholly and strangely human. It kind of made her want to see what he was all about, but it was a conflict of interest. She _killed_ demons, she didn't socialize with them!

Dante was dangerous. He was very dangerous. If and when she did see him again, she would have to proceed with caution.

The streets were absolutely deserted: nothing but empty, destroyed buildings and the odd corpse hanging out of a window or on the pavement. And then, suddenly, it was filled with helicopters and SWAT cars, police officers and FBI agents, ambulances and fire trucks, and a construction crew bringing up the rear. A part of her wanted to ask what took them so long, but she was more surprised to other people so suddenly, and more surprised by the fact that they had their guns aimed at her.

"Hands behind you head!" one of them called out, and for the life of her she couldn't tell from where. The helicopter was loudly buzzing above her, starting to swoop around to look for any other survivors.

Was that how they treated survivors? She supposed the missile launcher on her back didn't do much to convey a sense of innocence, but it didn't make her the cause of catastrophe. "I'm not a demon," she called out as she put her hands behind her head, a little bit unnerved by what was happening.

One of SWAT guys slowly crept forward, gun in hand, before stopping right in front of her. He paused for a moment, looking her up and down, before yelling to the others: "Wait, this is that girl."

"What?" Lady asked, incredibly paranoid. What did they mean? She didn't do anything, she had _helped_ to save them from a demonic threat!

"You sure?" one of the other men asked the first, stepping up to meet them.

"Shorter hair and a scar on her face, but that's her," the first one explained. "It's the eyes."

The second SWAT guy nodded and raised his hand, and at his signal the other men put down their guns. Lady breathed a sigh of relief.

"You Mary Arkham?" the second guy asked, but he didn't wait for her to answer. "We've been looking for you."

"Why?" Lady asked, not bothering to correct the man. They were looking for Mary Arkham ... well, she was the best they would get.

"Well, you've been _missing_ for four months."

* * *

"_And_ you cut your hair," Charles Randall said in exasperation as he walked into the interrogation room, as if they had already been talking and this wasn't the first time she had seen him in four months. "_Christ_, Mary, _look_ at you."

"Lady," she corrected, watching him pace near the door, which the cop had shut behind him. Surprisingly, she was grateful that they were alone instead of also with representatives from the school, because after getting interrogated by the police, she dreaded having a bunch of people in the room yelling at her—instead, she just got one incredibly angry lawyer.

"Yeah, and what's this I'm hearing about you calling yourself Lady? Your name is Mary, get over it," Randall snapped, continuing his annoyed pacing, staring more at the greenish gray linoleum tiles than at her.

Her eyes widened before settling into a glare. "Not if I change it," she muttered angrily.

"Good for you when you do, but right now you're in _big_ trouble, young lady." Randall finally turned to her, eyes running over her torn and battered appearance. She would have glared right back, but she felt vulnerable without her artillery—the cops had confiscated her rocket launcher and guns for examination or something—and her lawyer was fairly ruthless. She wasn't afraid of him, though: she had stared down scarier-looking monsters. And not that this encounter would end in violence, particularly without her guns, but a bullet or two would take him down. "You'd better not be bleeding on that chair."

"'Hi, are you okay? What happened? Can I get you to a doctor?'" Lady sarcastically asked. "No, instead I get the third degree."

Randall pinched the bridge of his nose before exhaling in frustration and taking slow, cautious steps towards her. "You tell us that you're still messed up from your mother's death and you need time," he started. "We tell you it's fine, go do some thinking, then come back to school the next semester and start getting to that paperwork that you've been _ignoring_ since I had it messengered to your room a _year_ ago. A month and a half later, the term starts, and where are you, Mary?" He paused for a moment, as if waiting for her to answer, which she didn't do. "You don't answer your phone, and then you eventually turn your phone off _completely_. What do you expect me to do? I have the school yelling at me to find you, I have the groundskeeper of your family's estate yelling at me, asking me if you're ever coming back or if the mansion is at least going to get _sold_, and really, Mary? Where were you? What were you doing?"

Lady looked down, not regretting her choice but still a little bit guilty for leaving Randall hanging like that, even if he was a big asshole. "Settling things," she answered, looking back up at him.

Randall laughed mirthlessly and sat on the corner of the table in front of her, shaking his head. "Do you even _realize_ how much of a stir you caused?"

"Look, you should be _glad_ I was where I was," Lady snapped, looking back up at him. "If I hadn't been there to help, the world would be overrun with _demons_."

"Demons, really?" Randall rolled his eyes. "Look, I know something weird was going on there, but... I mean what, do you fancy yourself some kind of _demon hunter_ now?"

"Yes!" she exclaimed, sitting up straighter in her chair, ignoring the slight ache of protest that her leg gave. They had given her some temporary stitches before shoving her into the helicopter to fly her here, but the wound needed to be properly cleaned and treated, so she was anxious to get to a hospital. She really wasn't sure why that couldn't have happened _before_ getting bitched out by her lawyer. "I have to! I can't let something like that happen again, and as long as there are demons it—"

"Look, I don't know if I even _believe_ that it was because of demons—" Randall started.

"What, the giant tower and demons swarming the city, killing thousands wasn't enough for you?" Lady snapped.

"I _know_ what I saw, I just..." her lawyer trailed off with a sigh, hand lightly massaging his forehead. "Look Mary—or Lady, or whatever you're calling yourself—I ... I _know_ that what happened really messed you up. That's why we let you take the end of last semester off, so you could go and sort through your problems, which you _could_ have done with a therapist but I respected your space when you said that you didn't want to talk to one. And I know that the cops asked you about your father and demons, but that doesn't..." He looked down and flicked a piece of lint off of his tie. "That doesn't mean that it was your business to sniff around the occult and hunt demons or whatever this bullshit is, because I'm not sure if I even want to believe any of it. Don't go barking up all of those alleys out of some sense of responsibility, because you have nothing to do with any of that. Going to that tower didn't bring your mother back; killing _demons_ won't bring her back either. You _have_ to move on."

Lady sighed, taking in the sight of her frazzled-looking lawyer, whose hand had returned to his forehead for a massage. She wasn't really sure what to tell him: she had long since made her decision, even if he wasn't going to like it. "Look," she started, meeting eyes with him, "I've already made my choice. I'm ... it's something I want to do. I can't let men li—"

She paused. She had purposefully left out the part about her father being the one who raised Temen-ni-gru: bringing up his involvement would not only open up the case of her mother's murder again, but potentially start up another one since _she_ had been the one to kill him. The last thing she needed was for all of that to come to the forefront again, the story of the tower attached to her name—which would always follow her to a certain extent even if she changed it—drawing press attention and other kinds of bad news and painful memories. Randall would probably agree with her because it would affect the sale of the Arkham estate, whenever that ended up happening. However she couldn't tell him, at least not in that specific moment when they were in a police station and likely being listened to by officials on the other side of the two-way mirror.

"—I can't let anything like that happen again," she continued, barely missing a beat. Randall didn't seem to question the brief pause, so she figured she was in the clear. "Demons are a _reality_, and it's not something that the cops—normal people, really—can handle."

"You're a normal person _too_," he interjected.

"No, I'm _not_," Lady argued. "It's too late for me to pretend that my life hasn't been fucked over. I know you'll tell me otherwise, but I don't have anything else." She paused, giving him the chance to do just that, and was surprised when he didn't. She expected him to put up a little bit more of a fight, though she was a bit relieved that he wasn't. "If I don't do it, I'll ... I don't know what. I don't expect you to understand."

"...I do," Randall softly agreed, looking more haggard than she had ever seen him before. "I can't stop you if that's what you want to do, anyway."

Though he would never admit it, Randall had a lot of personal stake in what happened to her: he had been her father's lawyer since before she had even been born, and had been devastated when Kalina Ann was discovered dead and Jonathan missing, accused of murder. Lady had known from the get-go that his overprotectiveness of her was his way of honoring the family he had once been so close to, trying to make sure that their sole heir would readjust after the trauma and be as successful as her parents had always wanted her to be. She felt bad, in that sense, that she was turning his attempts upside-down with her rebelliousness and talk of demon hunting, but what did he expect her to do? This was her life now, and there was no avoiding it.

"I'm sorry," she said, feeling oddly young and meek, and not like the strong demon hunter she aimed to be.

Randall sighed and rubbed his face, and all of the weariness seemed to melt off in favor of a sterner expression. "You're finishing school," he instructed. "You do that, and you take care of all of the paperwork I throw your way, and then your score with me is settled."

"Deal," she agreed, allowing herself to smile slightly at her victory.

"Okay, let's get you out of here so you can go to a hospital," Randall added, standing up and offering her his hand to help her up as well. She took it, since her entire body was now resisting every movement and she was pretty sure she wouldn't have been able to stand by herself. That, and it was the least she could do: Randall would never replace the family she lost, and she was pretty sure that wasn't his attempt, but standing by her despite the fact that she was going against his—who was acting for her father by extension—wishes she could swallow her pride for just a moment and let him give her a literal and metaphorical hand.

She wasn't sure how any of this was going to work out—the demon hunting or anything. She would just have to play it by ear, which oddly enough seemed to be a recurring theme for this "being Lady" thing that she had recently undertaken. Either way, it seemed to have been working to so far, albeit in sometimes in roundabout, unnecessarily painful ways, but it was worth a shot.

"I was serious when I said I wanted to change my name," Lady pointed out as they left the room. The first step, after all, was to make sure that Mary Arkham couldn't come back.

"To Lady?" he asked.

"Lady _Finlow_," she answered.

Randall glanced over at her. "Your mother's maiden name?" When she nodded, he smiled lightly and looked forward again. "I'll see what I can do."


	7. Rites of Passage

Sorry for the delay! I got sick last weekend and so my muse has gone off and hidden somewhere in _Kingdom Hearts II_—like, literally in the game _Kingdom Hearts II_—and I think I need to complete Jiminy's Journal to find her. Seriously. Anyway, I wanted to post some _Ephemerality_ because I know I can write it fairly quickly and I just need to start writing again. Meanwhile, HAVE SOME REVIEWER RESPONSES:

**Anonymous:** They don't know about it? I write when they don't have anything for me to do! Googledocs is GOD. And you're right—I was going to let Lady muse back on her time in school and settling the affairs etc just before talking to Dante, but I think actually having a short chapter that focuses on that alone would be stronger. Even if it's just a short bridge chapter, I think I need to have a little something, if only because I came up with so much for Lady's non-DMC life (like Randall—I have such a little crush on him just because he's so awesome and complicated in a minor character kind of way) and it would be a shame if I can't feature it even just a little.

**Pink Priestess:** I'm glad you're looking back at everything with a new perspective—that's what I was going for, after all! And my family says the same thing about me teaching them new words lol. And I'm sorry I haven't finished your giftshot yet—I've been rather busy this past week and haven't really had the time to sit down and write it. I fail. :(

**KuteInsanity: **I know what you mean. It's like: "Hey, look, played that earlier and now I get to read it. Woo." I like working on my own material more anyway—I feel less confined. I'm sure you can sympathize haha! And seeing as everything from this point on is new material...

This here chapter is Lady tying up Mary's loose ends, because Anonymous is right and I am wrong. X3 It's short, but it needed to be written. Now, fair readers, watch as I continue dodging giving names to locations!

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case I.4/II.1) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

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* * *

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**Ephemerality**

_6: Rites of Passage_

(corresponds to a moment between I.4: Shared Mission and II.1: Recurring Events)

"Well, that should be it." Randall took the document back into his hands, brown eyes skimming each page with calculating interest. After looking at the last page for a moment, he put down the papers and glanced up at Lady and the other men and women sitting in the room. "Yeah. That's it."

Mr. Cole took his wife's hand, squeezing it gently. It was a silent gesture of relief—almost like: "Honey, the house is _ours_"—which Lady found touching, albeit incredibly unnecessary. She had put up absolutely no fight when it came to them buying her family's estate, and to be honest, she was glad that the sale had gone through without much trouble. If anything, she thought it had been a little too easy, and wondered if the buyers had been asking themselves the same thing. She had almost expected someone to ask why she wanted to sell it as desperately as she did, in which case she would have just told them: "I just want nothing to do with it anymore."

That was the last of her family's affairs. Everything in the house—furniture, books, cars—had been appraised and auctioned off, finances arranged, and now the house had been sold. The money had gone to estate expenses, lawyer's fees, tuition at the boarding school, all of the ridiculous charges like the motorcycle and tune-ups of Kalina Ann, a rather large amount of artillery and ammunition, and the four months of motels and diners that led her to Temen-ni-gru; whatever was left would buy her an apartment of some kind and keep her alive until cash started coming in more steadily.

Life after high school. Now that was a scary thought.

"Hey." Lady was jostled from her thoughts when Randall placed his hand on her shoulder. She glanced to her left, the pleased look on his face belying his concern. Of course he was in a good mood—selling the Arkham estate was a huge deal, and he made a lot of money off of it. "Everything okay?"

Lady nodded. "Just a bit distracted," she answered, quietly so that only he could hear her. "I've got a lot on my mind."

"Try to look a bit happier about the sale in front of the Coles," Randall said, patting her shoulder lightly before retracting his hand, still looking at the happy couple in front of him, who had now turned to their similarly pleased lawyer. "It looks better, you know?"

"Yeah." She tried forcing a smile with some success, as Mrs. Cole noticed and beamed back at her. Whatever that woman wanted—the estate was hers to deal with. "Look," Lady said, looking back at Randall, "I actually have to be back at school for a final at 3, so I should probably get going."

"Of course, sorry," Randall apologized, quickly standing. "Ladies, gentleman," he added to the others assembled in the room. "Miss Arkham actually has to head out; she has some academic affairs to deal with."

"Oh, don't let us keep you," Mr. Cole said, standing just as Lady did—a sign of politeness, she figured—and extended his hand. "Thank you, Miss Arkham. For everything."

Lady couldn't bring herself to answer, instead smiling politely as she shook his hand, then Mrs. Cole's hand, and then the lawyer's hand—who had a surprisingly strong grip for such a slight woman. After this entire tedious business, the next hand she wanted to shake was the hand of the headmaster as he handed her her high school diploma, which ideally would be in two weeks. Until then, she was sick of polite handshakes and would avoid them like the plague. Fortunately, Randall ushered her out after some brief goodbyes and thank yous, for which she was glad: she wasn't very good at formalities, despite how much her parents had trained her for how to deal with her father's business associates. She guessed that was something Mary had been good at, and that she had lost.

"Thanks for putting up with the name during this whole process, by the way," Randall said as they made their way towards the exit of the building. "Now that the estate is sold, we can go ahead and change it to Lady Finlow, if you still want."

"Yes, _thank you_," Lady answered. She had trained herself not to wince at her old name, just for simplicity's sake. Of course she still wanted to officially change it to Lady for all future documentation, but as long as she had to deal with Mary's affairs, she would have to answer to Mary's name, as unpleasant as it felt. "As soon as I graduate, I'm going to stop answering to that terrible name."

Randall sighed at those words. "Lady, your father—" He paused, but didn't wince under the harsh glare that she immediately gave him, still facing forward and walking at his usual brisk pace. "He did some terrible things there at the end, but until that point ... I mean, he was a good man, everything else aside. I know why you don't want his name, but it's not ... that _bad_."

She sighed. He was probably thinking of the legacy, the job opportunities that she would receive just by saying that she was the great Jonathan Arkham's only daughter—all things that were completely irrelevant in her line of work, not to mention the fact that her legacy wasn't exactly something that she wanted to shout from the rooftops. Who would people remember, the chief executive officer of a small but fairly profitable bank, or the man who went crazy and killed his wife before disappearing, or perhaps some combination of the two? Either way, it wasn't a name that she wanted following her around. Too many questions asked.

"I stand by my decision," Lady answered very flatly, turning her head forward once more to watch where she was going. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Randall shake his head, sigh, and drop the subject.

"How many finals do you have left?" he asked instead, holding the door open for her as they stepped out of the building and headed towards the parking lot. "Not many, I would imagine."

"History and calculus. Then all I have are a few ceremonies, including graduation." They approached her new motorcycle—she had bought herself a new one for quick travel between her lawyer's office in the city and the boarding school she attended a little over an hour out, and while the new bike was technically a better one she found herself missing the little quirks of her old one, particularly all of the features she had included. She actually hadn't had the time to trick out this new motorcycle yet between the amount of schoolwork she was doing to make sure that she had taken enough classes to graduate and driving back and forth between school and the city for various legal dealings. "And that's it. Nothing but the future ahead of me." It was a scary thought, but she was open to it.

"Have you thought about where you're going after graduation?" Randall stood awkwardly next to the motorcycle, watching with wary interest as she opened up the compartment in the seat to retrieve her helmet. He had long since promised her that he would stop nagging her about riding that screaming metal deathtrap, but she could see the protests sitting in the little lines on his face as he frowned and tried really hard to tell her to get a real car. It was too bad he had never seen her _old_ bike—now _that_ was a screaming metal deathtrap.

"Not yet," Lady admitted. The issue was giving her rather a lot of trouble, which was a bit disconcerting given how resolute she was about pursuing demon hunting for the rest of her life. She had promised herself not to hunt after anything so long as she was in school—if she had to finish her education she at least wanted to do a good job of it—but she had been trying to keep her ears open in terms of what was going on in the area. There wasn't much demonic activity in the area, which was good for the people who lived here but bad for her business. She would have to go elsewhere, but the question was: where? "I'm not staying here, though. Nothing for me to do."

Randall tilted his head slightly, as if to disagree with her in some way, but politely held his tongue. Good, because she didn't feel like arguing about career choices with him today. He said that he accepted her decisions, and yet he always seemed to be pleading with her to reconsider, follow the path that her parents would have wanted to follow for her. She was tired of reminding him that Mary would have obeyed her parents, but Lady didn't have parents to obey so was free to run her own life.

"I just need to find someplace where demons are skulking," she continued, leaning against her motorcycle. "Start chipping away at the number there until they're all dead and I'm sure that no more can come, and then move on to the next place."

"Sounds like an almost nomadic lifestyle," Randall commented. "Almost as if you're going where the winds take you."

"It's not like I'll wipe out all of the demons in a city in a month, but yeah, that's kind of what I had in mind," Lady agreed. "If that's how I need to live, then that's how I'll live."

Randall watched her with hesitant eyes, scrutinizing her intensely as if looking for an answer or permission or something else entirely. It was a little disconcerting—he had a very intense gaze—but it almost left her curious as to what he had to say, not that she would ever admit it. Instead she held firm, hoping that her resolution was enough answer for him.

Something in the air between them shifted and Randall sighed, eyes finally lowering from her face to instead rest on the handlebars of her motorcycle. "You know," he started, shifting uncomfortably as he spoke, something that she had never seen him do, "I've been paying attention to the reports about demonic activity. They're saying that ... God, what's the name of that city; you know, the one that had the tower last year..."

"Yeah?" Lady responded breathily, a little stunned that _Randall_ of all people was going to give her a lead.

"They say there's a lot going on over there," he finished, eyes returning to hers with an absolutely _unreadable_ look. "It's probably worth looking into."

"I'll..." she started, but quickly stopped when she realized that she wasn't exactly sure how to respond.

Going back to that city ... that was something that she hadn't thought that she would do until she had fully come to terms with everything that had happened. It also meant seeing that one demon, Dante, which she had only planned on doing when she figured out a way to _kill_ him, and not before. And yet ... well, if it was the only lead she had, then she had no reason not to at least look into it, as Randall had said.

"Thank you," Lady said, smiling sincerely. At least he was trying to help, instead of fighting her plans.

"You're welcome," Randall answered, returning her smile with a slight one of his own. She had to admit; it was a million times more brilliant than the one he had been using in the office earlier over the signed documents, even though this was a lot smaller and subtler. Maybe he realized that he had actually done something for her personally—something that _she_ wanted, instead of something that he or her parents might have wanted for her—and she was almost a little touched by the fact that this seemed so important to him.

"I ... should probably go," Lady said after a moment, glancing down at her watch. "It's an hour back to school, and my final—"

"No, yeah, go," Randall agreed, his impassive mask returning. "I'll give you a call when I have the paperwork for the name change. And if I don't see you before then, I guess I'll see you at graduation?"

"Sure," Lady said. A part of her registered that Randall would be the only person who would be there to see her walk and wondered what that made their relationship, but shrugged off the thought. She imagined that they wouldn't keep in touch after she graduated, both too wrapped up in their lives to call up someone with whom they had once maintained a purely professional relationship. After all, she didn't think that she would use him as a lawyer after this point: he knew Mary far too well to be of any use to Lady. It seemed a shame to lose contact with him after everything that had happened, particularly given the somewhat paternal fondness that he seemed to feel for her, but if it happened she wasn't going to do anything to fix it.

Besides, she had gotten used to the idea of having to deal with things on her own, living in her little bubble of independence away from the authority of another's opinion. She didn't talk to anyone from her school anymore, in part because everyone had figured out that she didn't want to talk to them and had given up on trying to reach out to her. They were afraid of her scars anyway and certainly hadn't bothered to ask where she got them from, though there were rumors that she occasionally heard whispered when they thought she wasn't there to hear them.

Her favorite was the one where she had spent those months working as a double agent in a foreign government. Her least favorite was the one where her father had tried to kill _her_ too.

Even if she _wanted_ to talk to her peers, they were all too busy talking about this college and that college and what they planned on studying. How could she be expected to participate in such conversations when her future was so different than theirs? They were looking towards the future with excitement and slight nervousness; they were overgrown children who claimed to be adults despite being as wide-eyed and juvenile as before. She looked towards the future with sobriety, aware of the fact that this was the only path for her, and that the tiny fragments of her childhood that had remained after everything would very soon be lost for good.

It seemed almost amazing that over a year had passed since she had killed her father at the top of Temen-ni-gru. She wondered if that's what adulthood was like: time moving faster than she would want it to move until she was old and broken and incapable of doing the things she had promised herself she would do. But at least being an adult meant that she could finally free herself of her obligation to Mary: soon she would be able to live her life as Lady instead of having to answer to a dead girl's name.

And yet the question remained: if Mary had been here, where would Lady go? Randall's suggestion seemed promising—she imagined that Temen-ni-gru's function as a portal to Hell remained even when the tower had crumbled, so there would be a lot of demons to kill. But she wasn't sure if she was prepared to face Dante again, not only because she still wasn't sure how to kill him, but because...

...because she had no real reason not to trust him. Dante was one of two people who knew her as both Mary and as Lady, and unlike Randall he saw her first and foremost as Lady, having christened her as such. The fact that he was an arrogant demon aside, he wanted to help and protect her, maybe even befriend her. He was a fellow demon hunter—and a strong one at that, she had seen from the way he fought—and could help her in her mission to kill all demons, even if he ended up being a casualty himself.

She hated it. She hated knowing that she could have someone she could trust. And she hated herself for doubting her own reasoning as to why she should stay away from him. Worst of all, it seemed as though she would have to come to some kind of decision about what she would do about him a lot sooner than she would have liked, if she did in fact move back to that fateful city.

But that was still a little too far in the future—Lady still had high school to finish, after all, and _then_ she would play it by ear. Meanwhile, she shot Randall one more brief smile, put on her helmet, and swung herself onto her motorcycle.

"Take care," Randall said as she started the engine, taking a step back to give her room to drive out of the parking lot. He said it with such finality given the fact that she would see him again.

"You too," she said, and when he didn't say anything, instead staring at her with the same unreadable look on his face, she drove out of the parking lot and into the streets, following her familiar trajectory back to the boarding school. Before long Lady would graduate from high school and have to deal with the future. Meanwhile, she could enjoy the feeling of the wind as she drove her motorcycle a little too quickly, and hope that she would never grow old.


	8. Dante 2

I'm slowly but surely trying to build a buffer with this fic—that way when I take weeklong "vacations" from writing, I have something to post anyway! The next chapter is already done, but I won't post it for a few more days. (Or until I finish the next one lol).

**Anonymous:** THAT'S SO FUNNY: I actually added the Alden scenario to my outline today! Are you in my head? And I'm glad you see what I like so much about Randall. I actually miss him already!

...where did everyone else go? D:

Anyway, here is Lady seeing Dante for the first time after Temen-ni-gru, and I can't remember if anyone in particular requested it. Coming up next: the street corner scene.

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case II.1) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

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**Ephemerality**

_7: Dante 2_

(corresponds to a moment in II.1: Recurring Events)

Lady had everything worked out to perfection. She had driven into the city with all of her belongings—which wasn't much, since she had thrown most of Mary's stuff out—and found a nice apartment in a part of town that wasn't too sketchy, but where they still wouldn't ask too many questions about her career and all of those guns she carried around. The landlady, an older woman named Mrs. Harris, seemed a little brusque, but Lady could appreciate that in a person since she was a little curt herself. All she needed to do was buy a little bit of furniture and she would be set.

Randall's tip had been a good one: there was no shortage of demons in this city, since the location of the tower made it a spiritual nexus. There would be plenty of work for her despite the fact that there was already a demon hunter in the city, and a good one—Dante had made a bit of a name for himself, and was known by some as the man who stopped the threat of Temen-ni-gru. Of course he had taken all of the credit for himself, she had noted with much bitterness. It wasn't like she had helped, or that she had been the one to actually kill the man behind all of it. _Clearly_ he had done _everything_ himself, or so he claimed. She didn't want media attention or celebrity status or anything, but a little bit of credit to her name so that potential clients would know that she was a reliable demon hunter.

So when she was driving through the city to get to the furniture store that Mrs. Harris had recommended and happened to notice a big neon sign that said: "Devil May Cry," she couldn't resist the urge to swing by and give him a piece of her mind.

Lady didn't actually want to pick a fight with him or anything—she wasn't ready for that just yet. All she wanted to do was let him know that she was around but that she didn't want anything to do with him. It was what she had told herself to do when she had officially decided to move here a week back: he made her uncomfortable, so the best thing she could do was to just keep away from him. She had almost hoped that she could just avoid him until they _had_ to meet, but that was unrealistic. The best way to take care of him and make sure that he didn't bother her was to just get everything out in the open as soon as possible and pray that he actually listened to her. She wouldn't put anything past a demon like him.

She almost chickened out when she parked her bike in front of the shop, but felt a surge of confidence when the name of his office dawned on her: he had named it "Devil May Cry," after something she had said almost a year ago to comfort him? She wasn't sure if she was touched or a bit weirded out. Either way, she needed to set up boundaries so that he would leave her alone and let her live her life in relative simplicity and peace.

Pushing open the dark wooden doors, the first thing Lady noticed was not the white-haired, red-coated demon sitting casually with his feet on a dark wood desk, his handsome—she nearly hit herself for thinking that—face obscured by a magazine with a curvaceous woman on the cover. The first thing she actually noticed was that the office was an absolute mess. There were pizza boxes piled up in corners and two on his desk, one looking like it had just been delivered, with beer and soda cans strewn about, some crushed. He probably hadn't swept or dusted in some time either, as there seemed to be a thin layer of grime over everything from the floors to the windows to the furniture. The walls were adorned with anything from posters of half-naked women to demon heads, hung like trophies, staring back at her with their faces contorted into painful grins.

Lady had never considered herself particularly prissy, but if she wasn't cleaning herself—and she was a relatively clean and organized person—then she had had a maid cleaning for her. It was jarring to go from pristine mansion to organized dorm room to disgusting, frat boy home. He _must_ have been some kind of frat boy, the way he kept his office.

"We're closed for lunch," Dante announced, not bothering to look up from his magazine to address her directly. Did he even realize that it was her, and not some random client or solicitor? "If you're looking for the bathroom, the one downstairs is broken, and there's no way in _hell_ I'm letting anyone use my bathroom upstairs, so—"

"You live _here_?" Lady instinctively asked, arms crossed tight and grimacing in disbelief. Why would anyone want to _live_ in a dump like this?

This seemed to get his attention. Dante looked up, face expressing recognition before his eyes even met hers. He seemed absolutely flabbergasted, as if he hadn't expected her to actually show up, giving her body a quick go-over with his eyes. Yeah, she wasn't going to make a habit of visiting him.

"It's a _dump_," she added, because he clearly wasn't going to say anything from the way he was staring at her in shock, mouth slightly agape. Actually, she rather liked it when he wasn't saying anything; it certainly beat the way he had been cockily mouthing off in the tower.

"No it's not," Dante protested a little half-heartedly, still a little distracted by the sight of her, apparently. He removed his feet from the table, leaning forward to look at her a little better. She had to admit, she didn't particularly enjoy the way that he was staring at her—it was too intense, too ... she wanted to say a little pleased, but she couldn't tell for sure.

"I shouldn't have been surprised anyway," Lady continued, walking a little bit to keep moving instead of just standing there for him to stare at her. A part of her wanted to just cut to the chase and tell him to stay away from her, but that would be too abrupt and probably make him want to bother her anyway. She would have to play nice, or at least unfriendly but not inconsiderate. "You looked like you could have been a slob when I first met you."

"Not like I was _expecting_ company," he responded, and she detected a hint of cheekiness in his voice. What, was he trying to guilt her? He definitely wasn't trying to hint that he wanted her to leave, that was for sure—not the way he was staring at her.

She snorted softly, stopped just in front of his desk. She noticed that he was actually wearing a _shirt_ under that red coat of his, which was definitely an improvement to his cavalier appearance, but a part of her actually missed the sight of his strong upper body—

—she had to stop thinking things like that.

"Sorry I didn't warn you," Lady said unapologetically, keeping her nose in the air. Maybe if she just kept playing it bitchy, she would convince him—_both_ of them—that it would be best if they stayed clear of the other.

"You could have sent a postcard or something," Dante said, crossing his arms and leaning back in his chair with a casualness that felt a little bit refreshing in place of the earlier intensity. He was still watching her intently, but now that he wasn't leaning forward and gaping she felt a little more comfortable standing in the room. "I was starting to wonder what happened to you. You know, vaguely," he added, brushing her off entirely.

Well obviously he hadn't been thinking about her much, since he seemed to be taking credit for stopping the threat of Temen-ni-gru on his own. "I've been busy," she coldly explained. "I had affairs to sort through, and now I'm done."

"Affairs?" he asked, a little bit predictably. Either way, it was none of his business.

"This area is a spiritual nexus because of the presence of Temen-ni-gru," Lady continued, dodging his question by telling him the same mantra that she had been repeating on her drive down—what had convinced her that coming to this city was a good idea despite his presence. She took a step back from the desk and allowed herself to look around, pretending not to notice a spiderweb in the corner with a big brown spider . "It doesn't matter if the tower crumbled; it still serves as a gateway for lesser demons to cross over into the human world." All things that he probably knew; or maybe he didn't and was killing demons without really understanding why they were there. Yet again, he probably knew his own _kind_ and their behavioral patterns fairly well. "There are a few others, but this is the strongest."

She noticed the dust on the window frame near where she had stopped, and finally uncrossed her arms to run a finger through the dust in morbid curiosity. It came back dark and dirty. She almost asked him where he kept his cleaning supplies.

"There aren't many demons where I was, and any that were showing up were coming from here," she finished. She had figured out that they were coming from here despite the 800-mile distance, simply because the only other ones were across the country, and therefore a needless trek. "I figured moving here would be a shrewder business move."

She turned to look back at him to find that he was grinning widely. Oh fuck, what was that look for? "Great!" Dante exclaimed, sitting up in his chair. "So you're moving here?"

No, Lady planned on commuting 800 miles to work every day. "Well, I already signed the lease on my new apartment, so it's pretty definite by this point," she answered, rubbing the pads of her fingers together to remove the black residue that had gathered there.

"Wait, why not live _here_?" Dante offered, still oddly cheerful. "It'll be easier that way."

She felt her mouth open in shock, and chose to narrow her eyes so as to look more menacing. What the hell was he talking about? "Easier for what?" she slowly asked, trying really hard not to lose her temper.

"The commute?" he answered as if it was the most obvious thing. No! It wasn't! "I have a spare room, so it's no big deal. I can get you set up whenever."

"Why on earth would I want to live _here?"_ Lady demanded. He was a demon! She wanted nothing to do with him! And ... it was dirty! "And what commute? Who said I would be working with you?"

Dante frowned and crossed his arms, his chest inflating with boldness. "Why did you come here, then, if you weren't going to?" He raised an eyebrow, and she almost saw the cogs turning in his head. "I'm pretty sure you didn't just stop by to say hi, so you had to have a reason."

Good boy; he wasn't as dumb as he looked. "You're right," she admitted, walking back over to his desk and leaning against it, palms against the wooden surface. His eyes betrayed the fact that she was giving him a nice view of her cleavage, but she didn't care, instead keeping a determined look on her face as she glared at him. "I'm just here to set the record straight."

Dante didn't respond, so she adjusted her stance, leaning over more to rest her elbows against the table and fold her fingers together. "I work independently," she continued. "I'm not working with you. Therefore, I don't want you getting in my way. You aren't accompanying me on jobs, you won't 'help' me at all—" She nearly spat the word "help" at him. "—or interfere in any way because that might jeopardize how much I get paid. Mainly I just want you to stay the hell away from me. I won't be contacting you either. Oh, and I have no interest in spending time with you on the side. I've had my fill of you already."

_There_. Lady sighed inwardly, glad that she finally got all of that out of her system.

Dante stared straight at her with an unreadable look on his face—something between being confused, offended, and maybe a little amused, she guessed. "So ... basically you want nothing to do with me?" he clarified.

"Pretty much." Confident that he had gotten the message, she stood up straight and put her hands on her hips. "You'll do your thing and I'll do mine."

"And what about the part where we were supposed to work _together_?" Dante asked, standing up and leaning against his desk in a similar fashion to the way she had first been leaning forward. He seemed to be trying the same intimidation tactic that she had just been using on him. "Remember that part, where we were supposed to work together to take down demons? 'Cause I do."

"I never said that," Lady protested truthfully. She hadn't, had she? No, she had told him that he could live to kill demons, and they would work simultaneously but not together. She had never even considered working with him, or anybody else for that matter—although having a partner might be a shrewd business move, but not one that she was willing to make, especially not with him. "As far as I'm concerned, I'll kill me demons, you'll kill yours, and when we're all done, I'll come right back here and kill _you_."

The look on Dante's face told her that he hadn't expected her to say that—in fact, that he was hurt by it. Why? They had already talked about this. "I thought you said you wouldn't kill me," he said, almost stunned to silence from the dumb way that he had answered.

"I never said that," Lady clarified. God, now he was making her feel guilty. Had he actually assumed that she _would_ give him a chance to prove that he was a demon worth sparing? Maybe she had been too nice to him by the end of their earlier conversation. "I said that I'd _deal_ with it when the time came. Were you even listening to what I said, or did you just hear what you wanted to hear?"

Dante paused; she guessed that he had done just that. "That such a bad thing?" he asked, feigning nonchalance. She saw right through it.

"Only when you start assuming things," she said coldly, shifting her weight. How was it that he was making her feel guilty because of his _own_ stupidity? She had to just go back to her earlier plan: tell him that she wanted nothing to do with him and leave. This had been dragged out long enough. "Just stay out of my way, and everything will turn out fine. Alright?"

"Alright," Dante agreed after a momentary pause.

Lady frowned. He wasn't fighting her on this. What the hell? "Alright," she said after a moment, her back straightening in tension. "Glad we're on the same page."

"Sure," he concurred, still staring at her, his expression impenetrable. She frowned; she had to get out of there, away from this confusing demon with his piercing blue eyes—

—she really needed to stop thinking about this appearance. Maybe _that_ was what made demons so dangerous.

"Okay then," Lady finished, nodding. He _had_ to be fucking with her head, and it seemed to be working. "I'll just be on my way then."

"See you around," Dante said, before shaking his head and acridly correcting himself: "No, wait, I won't. Right. Not bothering you."

At least the passive-aggressiveness was easier to understand. Still frowning, she quickly walked over to the door, not turning back to look at him. It wasn't until she opened the door that she allowed herself to slow down, standing in the frame while the finality of all of it drummed in her ears. As much as Lady wanted to steer clear of him, she still felt like there were too many questions and concerns hanging in the air. She was the type of person who didn't like to leave things unfinished, and the unresolved nature of their admittedly brief alliance left her feeling rather unsettled. Dante was the kind of person who seemed to be unintentionally enigmatic—it was easy to pass him off as predictable and transparent, but she realized that she actually didn't know anything about him other than what he had actually told her. And as much as she wanted to know ... maybe she was better off not knowing at all.

But she would allow herself one question: "Dante," Lady called back, still facing forward. It was the first time she had said his name out loud since the night of Temen-ni-gru, and somehow she found it just as enjoyable to say as she had then. That, too, was dangerous.

"Yeah?" she heard him answer.

"'Devil May Cry?'" she asked, fingers drumming the doorframe that she was gripping tightly, holding her in place. She wasn't sure if she wanted to move forward and run out of there, or back to actually look at him while he considered her question.

"Yeah," Dante answered. "You like it?"

She nearly laughed; she had no idea. "Sure, why not," she answered vaguely. She might as well be honored.

With that, she passed through the door and allowed it to slam behind her. And that was the last she would probably—hopefully—see of the demon hunter Dante, Lady realized with a sigh. It would be easier that way.


	9. Brothers in Arms

The more I write about Lady's issues, the more I realize how messed up I made her. Poor thing—my only comfort is that I know she'll find some peace, or at least get pretty close to it. But you guys already knew that. ;)

**KuteInsanity:** Yeah, Alden's going to be in the next chapter—you know I had originally just randomly thrown him into the fic, but now that I'm really writing out Lady's POV I can see where he as a character really ties into Lady's complexes. I'm glad to know that you're excited to read about him!

**Soul of Ashes:** Oh wow, thanks! You've only read the first chapter so far, so hopefully by the time you make it up here you'll still be enjoying it. And I totally do the same thing with my own fics. It's like: "Oh, okay, I can write the next chapter... OR I CAN READ _KINGDOM HEARTS_ FICS. WHAT SHALL I CHOOSE." I'm shameless.

**Anonymous:** Lady's denial only gets more complicated from here on in, believe me... From my perspective as the writer—wow, that sounds more pretentious than it is—I almost find the denial comic, since it's so tied into her emotional turmoil and issues. Wow, things I should not find funny, and yet they are. Anyway, I can only hope that the issues are coming across with the right amount of balance, because at this point I'm worried that I might be hitting people over the head with her angst, haha.

**Eric Draven201:** Oh gosh I totally read fics on my phone too—I once did it when I was really bored in this seminar but didn't have my laptop with me. Well I'm glad you've been enjoying the story so far, and I hope you continue enjoying it!

Here we go: the street corner scene, as requested by ... well, I'm sure _someone_ requested it, I'm just too lazy to go check. By the way, some of the specific details surrounding the night of Kalina Ann's murder that I mentioned but didn't fully describe will come up, in a somewhat fucked up way.

…I'm not torturing my characters if they do this to themselves!

The next chapter is Alden, and it's already written. (Me struggling with it is why this one took so long to post...) The one after that will be shorter, so I'm hoping to post again by the end of the work week!

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case II.1) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

* * *

**Ephemerality**

_8__: Brothers in Arms_

(corresponds to a moment in II.1: Recurring Events)

There were days that Lady, as strong as she was, envied Mary's old life. Mary had friends and a boyfriend, loving parents, and a life ahead of her to look forward to—what this life would be she hadn't figured out yet, but she had know would be exciting. Lady had acquaintances and the occasional fuck, dead parents, and a seemingly endless mission to drive her forward—when she would finally accomplish this she didn't know, but she guessed that she would die trying. Despite having spent so much time and energy insisting that Mary was dead, Mary was dead, she was Lady now, Mary was dead, she was starting to wonder if giving up on the younger girl hadn't been such a good idea after all, because at least Mary saw things with a wider-eyed wonder that Lady had completely lost.

These were thoughts that Lady ignored, for the most part. It was easy to forget about the what-might-have-been when her life had taken such a specific course and was relentlessly following it. Mary's dreams and memories, friends and family—all of it had been thrown out with the rest of her belongings when she moved out of her dorm room, got on her motorcycle, and drove those familiar 800 miles towards the life that she had chosen to assume.

And then there were the anniversaries.

There were a few dates that were burnt into her memory that whatever was left of Mary wouldn't let her forget. T-Night—the people's colloquial way of referring to what had been labeled "The Tower Massacre," and while the T stood for "Tower" she always thought of it as "Temen-ni-gru" instead—was one of them, but that was something that Lady herself had experienced, even though it had been a part of the long process of closure for Mary's life. Then there were Mother's Day and Father's Day, which only served to remind her of the fact that she had no parents, which their birthdays also did to a lesser extent.

The worst was the anniversary of her mother's death. _Murder_. That day always threw her for a loop, left her feeling shaky and uncoordinated, and highly inefficient at anything she did from demon hunting to grocery shopping. The best she could do was try to lead as normal of a day as possible, despite the overwhelming sensation of abnormality.

Dante only complicated that.

To Lady's credit, she had gotten used to the fact that he would somehow be a part of her life whether she liked it or not. They were both demon hunters, so it wasn't much of a stretch if they both showed up in the same place, having been called on the same job. Lady believed that Dante wasn't actually doing it on purpose, despite the advances that he always made when he saw her, because they happened so inconsistently—it was obviously a case of two people calling in the same job, or a person opting to call both of them instead of one or the other. She only wished that she could have more warning, if she was going to be forced to see him. Either way, her strategy was simple: they split up, and whoever found the demon got the spoils. Unfortunately, that tended to be Dante, but at least it meant that she didn't have to deal with him. In fact, as the years went on, she started thinking that the fact that she wasn't always getting paid those nights was the most annoying part of having to work "with" him.

On the anniversary, though, Lady wanted nothing to do with the white-haired demon. She had been fortunate enough to avoid him in previous years, allowing herself to fuck up during missions away from the judging gaze of others, but when he had found her, back to the wall as she fired fruitlessly at a gelatinous spider demon, Kalina Ann out of her reach, she knew that this spelt trouble. By the end of that mission, she was not only covered in black goo, but also down on a lot of ammunition, regretting only bringing two grenades with her—how could she have forgotten?—and incredibly ashamed of the fact that Dante had stood there _laughing _at her as she had struggled to take care of the demon. And when he had asked her what was wrong, she had told him that it was none of his business. It was none of _anyone's_ business.

Cash from the sloppy but ultimately completed job in one of her pockets, she drove to a street corner she usually made a point of avoiding. People who had survived the slaughter or moved into the city after it was rebuilt all took vigil around the perimeter of where the tower had been on T-Night, leaving flowers and pictures, crying, and cursing the demons that took so many lives. Silently they thanked the heroes that kept them safe from the continued demonic threat, but very subtly—a part of them still didn't want to admit that demons were real and could kill them, and as long as they didn't acknowledge the creatures too loud they would be safe.

While the general area—which she had long since realized was around Dante's office, something that likely brought him nothing but joy—tended to get overrun, one spot in particular was famous for attracting mourners: the corner that faced where the entrance to Temen-ni-gru had once been. This is where she found herself standing, the night of the anniversary of her mother's murder, simply because the corner was the closest thing that held any kind of significance to her mother's life; everything else, including the grave, was 800 miles away. Even though Kalina Ann had never been there, it was where Lady had finally been able to avenge her death, and therefore was the best place to mourn when she was so far from the place that Mary had called "home."

Lady stood, bathed in the pink light of the neon sign that lured the more degenerate residents of the city to the strip club just across the street, and looked up at a point impossibly high in the sky, far higher than any of the skyscrapers in the city's bustling downtown. They said that the tower had crumbled without any intervention from the construction crews that had come with the rest of the SWAT team and assistance, perhaps because it had lost its purpose after Vergil and her father had died, aware of the fact that nobody else in the vicinity would try to use its power. With it, she guessed, as nobody had claimed otherwise, had crumbled any demonic artifacts or books from that massive library, forever burying the tower's secrets. Maybe a stray book or amulet had been found and locked away by the government or stolen by a fraudulent construction worker or police officer, but given the fact that nothing of the same magnitude had occurred in the past four and a half years, it was safe to assume that Temen-ni-gru would not rise again, a fact that brought her immeasurable relief.

Unfortunately, it didn't do much to relieve the ache of everything she had lost to witness it.

"It's not the anniversary," she heard a voice say. She didn't need to turn to see that it was Dante. A part of her wanted to accuse him of following her—after all, the street was otherwise empty, and it was strange that _he_ of all people would show up—but she _was_ in _his_ neighborhood, and he had every right to be there. Maybe he was even going to that strip club. She wouldn't put it past him.

"It is for me," she answered plainly, still looking up. She wasn't even sure why she had just admitted that, but to be honest, she was too tired to put up any kind of fight.

"How long has it been?" Dante asked, still standing at a respectable distance from her. Lady wondered how he had even known what day it was, but was almost grateful for the fact that he had asked. A part of her really wanted to _tell_ someone, _talk_ about it for the first time in how many years now—had she ever really sat down and opened up to someone? She wasn't even sure. She hadn't really sat down and had a heart-to-heart with anyone since that day.

What was left of Mary was screaming at her to _tell_ him. Just ... _tell_ him. She would feel better about it. It would bring her the peace that, despite everything she had done from patricide to selling the mansion, she had never actually found.

"Six years," Lady said after a surprisingly short amount of time. She hadn't even considered the consequences of opening up to this demon, but maybe it _was_ about time she allowed herself to speak.

Yes, she could trust him. For now, anyway.

"I wasn't even there," she admitted, bitterness bubbling in her voice like acid and bile in her gut. "I was at boarding school. They called me to tell me that _she_ was dead and _he_ was missing. He was obviously a suspect in the case, but they couldn't find him." She looked over at Dante with guarded eyes, worried that she had said too much to him and that he would now use this information to mock her like he had earlier. To her surprise, he was watching her with tastefully sympathetic eyes, giving her as much room as she needed to speak.

There was so much more she could tell him about that night. She could tell him about what she had been doing when the phone call had come; the arduous drive down to the manor, hands tightly laced in her lap; the sight of her mother, looking as beautiful as ever in her powder blue and red-stained nightgown, a strangely serene look on her face despite the stab wounds all over her body and the bonds tying her to the king-sized bed; the hours spent in the police station, answering questions robotically, leaving out details that might have been important to the investigation but that she chose to keep for her own vengeful purposes; what had happened when she finally _did_ break down... All things that, while absolutely essential to really opening up about everything, she didn't particularly feel like divulging. There were certain images, sentiments, and regrets that she didn't feel like drawing up and remembering in such detail.

Instead, she chose to focus on things that were more relevant to Dante's sphere of information—things that surrounded her father and her quest for vengeance. "The man you met on the Tower?" Lady continued. "He didn't use to look like that. He used to be handsome." He had been a great father, albeit occasionally absent due to all of the work he had to do. She wondered if that had all been a façade.

Dante stepped closer to her, moving to lean against the wall right next to her. The neon light cast a pink halo around his white hair, eyes vibrant despite the fact that his face was in a shadow. Once again she broke the promise she had made and allowed the briefest shimmer of admiration to warm her core. He wasn't such a bad guy if he was going to listen to her. She had long since figured out that he would be one of the few people who could understand her, and no matter how much she wanted to prevent that from ever happening, tonight she wanted someone to rely on.

Or maybe _Mary_ did—even after all these years, there were moments that Lady wondered who was speaking.

"I became an emancipated minor, and while I legally owned my family's estate I refused to live there," she continued, almost casually. "I paid the school extra on top of my normal tuition to let me live there year-round." Lady felt the bile stir up again as she remembered her father, and added, seamlessly: "It took me over a year to find him again, and when I did I dropped out of school and tracked him down. I found out that he and Vergil were trying to raise the Tower, only I didn't know where, so by the time I did find out and came here it was too late to stop them. All I knew was that I wanted that fucker _dead_."

The look on Dante's face had changed slightly, to one that seemed like understanding. Maybe bringing up Vergil had made him relate to her more—after all, as he had told her years earlier, it was _his_ family matter too. Her curiosity piqued for an instant, and she wondered what heartbreak was behind the twisted rivalry between the two brothers, but she immediately extinguished it. It was probably _just_ sibling rivalry, and nothing more. He was a demon; he wasn't _like_ her.

Lady wasn't sure what to say anymore; the rest was history, with the exception of the things she refused to divulge to _anyone_, much less a demon. They fell into a silence that wasn't particularly comfortable or uncomfortable—it just _was_. Dante reached out and put his hand on her shoulder, and the firm pressure burnt her in a way that she didn't know she could be burnt anymore.

It wasn't... She just wasn't close to anyone anymore. All she had were acquaintance and the occasional fuck. Dante's touch promised more, but she couldn't identify what that "more" was.

Lady laughed despite herself, and for reasons that she couldn't even begin to fathom leaned into his arm. Mary recognized it as a desire to fight against the loneliness that had settled into her core. Lady couldn't tell the difference between forced and voluntary solitude anymore. "Six years," she mused, and Dante now wrapped his arm around her shoulder, drawing him into his chest; she leaned in. "Six years."

Six years since her mother's death and father's transformation; six years since her life was turned upside down. Six years since Mary stopped being Mary and started turning into someone else entirely, someone with a lesser capacity for love and, despite how strong she tried to be, a greater capacity to get hurt. Six years since she had given up on Mary's bright future. Six years since Lady had started trying to force everything Mary out of her life, only to find that the past wasn't so easily forgotten. "Nothing's changed," she added very softly, glancing up at Dante. Even if Lady didn't have bright, hopeful dreams for the future, she had imagined that she would have made a life for herself by this point instead of being a pale, jaded imitation of the girl she had once been.

Unable to maintain eye contact any longer, particularly when Dante was scrutinizing her so intently, Lady angled her head back up towards the invisible edifice in front of them. She almost pulled away when she felt the demon hold her just a little bit tighter, bringing her just a little bit closer to his chest, but opted not to, instead listening to his steady breathing as he, like her, gazed up at the tower that had been such a turning point in both of their lives.

Maybe things _had_ changed, though she was beginning to wonder if she even _wanted_ them to.


	10. Alden Sinclair

When I first mentioned Alden in II.2, it was more to add to the sense that Dante and Lady weren't the _only_ demon hunters around, and to give Dante a little bit of jealousy with regards to potential other friendships that Lady could have. I hadn't really thought of Alden too much as a person, which is kind of a bad habit as an author—I don't want to mention someone without really defining them as a person. His significance is kind of retconned in, but actually motivates subsequent chapters. I'm interested in seeing what you guys think!

Here's actually another one of those _Ephemerality_ chapters that doesn't follow the same "one moment, one chapter" rule that I have set up, mainly because Lady's interactions with Alden are more spread out and I don't want to split this up into multiple chapters.

**Anonymous:** Oh, I'm glad that you think it's working! I'm always so nervous about laying it on too thick, so I'm relieved to hear that you don't think it is, haha. As for Lady failing to acknowledge him as a person ... you're going to like the chapter I just finished writing, which I'm posting next. :)

**Bakabara:** Thank you, and I hope I don't disappoint! I really miss Vergil too—he's so snarky and amazing, but there's no way he could "come back" until after IV, at least, and even then it's highly improbable... UGHHHH he makes me want to write AU!

**Pink Priestess:** Thank you as usual, dear! :) Expect a lot more Dante from here on in. There will still be a few chapters where he's not around (like this one!) the majority of the chapters from this point on are Dante-tastic. Woo!

**zenbon zakura:** Lol yeah, Dante can be pretty smooth when he wants...!

This chapter was requested by Anonymous—strangely enough the same day that I decided to add the chapter to the outline—and KuteInsanity. The next chapter takes place the night that Dante and Lady work together on the job in the freighter, and is very simply called "The Blanket." I'm not going to say much about it because I want it to be more or less a surprise. :)

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case II.1) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

* * *

**Ephemerality**

_9: Alden Sinclair_

(corresponds to a between in II.1: Recurring Events and II.2: Unforeseen Circumstances)

Alden Sinclair had brown eyes. That was the first thing she had noticed about him: he had big brown eyes that very clearly conveyed the fact that he had no idea what he was doing. It wasn't something that she could criticize about him, since she knew that she had probably looked the same way on her first mission, the first time she saw demons. At the same time, it was something that pissed her off about him—he couldn't go around looking like a deer in the headlights if he wanted to be taken seriously as a demon hunter.

One of Lady's contacts, a somewhat secretive but still trustworthy man who called himself Grant, had suggested that the young man contact her in order to talk to a more experienced hunter. It hadn't even occurred to her that anyone else would ever be interested in the career, but she figured that more people were exposed to demons now that there were more open portals and passages between Hell and Earth. In fact, for that very reason, she was surprised that there weren't more punks running around with guns and knives claiming to be demon hunters and getting themselves into a lot of trouble, but she wasn't going to jinx herself.

Alden, on the other hand, seemed legitimate. Wide-eyed and more than a little overwhelmed, but legitimate. He was here to network—no, it was more innocent than that: he was here for guidance. She didn't think she would be a particularly good teacher, but she guessed that if the choice for advice was between her and a guy like Dante, it was best to go with the organized human girl instead of the sloppy demon.

Come to think of it, she wondered who, if anyone, knew that he was a demon. It was still strange to her that a demon would hunt other demons, but she imagined that other people might not take that information as well as she had.

But enough of Dante; this nice boy Alden was sitting in front of her, waiting for her to answer his question. She had agreed to meet him at a coffee shop—he had nervously mentioned that he was too young to get into bars, which was where she usually met clients and contacts. Age had never stopped _her_ when it came to meeting clients in bars, having turned twenty-one earlier in the year, but having breasts had always worked to her advantage when she was still only eighteen years old and trying to get her foot in the door.

So had her gun.

"Sure, why not, I'll help you," Lady answered, casually taking a sip of coffee in order to mask the smile she almost let slip when he sighed in relief. He was lucky that she wasn't charging him, but he was kind of cute in a strange way, so she was willing to make this one a favor. After all, he was just starting out. "What is it you need me to do, exactly?"

"Go with me on my first job," Alden said, leaning forward in his chair excitedly. "For backup, I guess, but mainly I want you to tell me what I'm doing well and what I need to keep working on."

Lady nodded: it was a reasonable enough request. It would kind of suck if she had to refuse a good job as a result, but she liked to think that the good karma would catch up with her if she did this boy a favor. "Sounds good. Do you have one tonight?"

"I ... don't have it lined up just yet," he admitted, brown eyes seeming to turn just a shade darker out of embarrassment. Or maybe it was just the lighting. She wasn't sure. "I'm not really sure how to start up, that's the problem."

She was a little surprised that he didn't already know this, but she guessed that this was why he had come to her for help. "You usually just start with a contact," Lady explained, sitting up straight and resting her arms on the table. "They hear things about demons hanging around an area or in a building, and act as a go-between with the client. Usually it's because the client doesn't want to talk to a demon hunter directly."

"Why?" Alden asked curiously.

"Denial, I guess?" she offered, shrugging lightly. "Your average person still doesn't want to admit that there are demons out there. If they're talking to a liaison, then it's like they're talking to some random person. If they're talking to a demon hunter, then there's definitely something wrong. That, and I think we scare them a little."

"Why would anyone be scared of you?" Alden immediately got flustered and started backpedaling. "Not that you're not a really cool, intimidating demon hunter or anything, but you're also ... you're nice, and you're pretty, so it seems weird that anyone would be scared of you."

Lady smiled lightly, and not just because she was amused by the fact that he had described her as _nice_—she wasn't necessarily mean, but she didn't necessarily consider herself a nice person. Usually men only got embarrassed around her if she started trying to manipulate them with her sexuality, and yet Alden was blushing in the middle of a simple conversation. It reminded her of how things used to be before her mother's murder, when all of the boys who were going through puberty would get nervous while talking to her. She found herself wondering how old he was exactly, despite the fact that she could tell that he was an older teen. He was cute, in a way.

"They're scared because we know how to kill," she said, still smiling a little, even as the conversation grew darker in nature. "We're like mercenaries or bounty hunters, only we make our living killing things that can kill normal people."

Alden nodded, soaking in the information.

"Besides," Lady continued, "it's best to have a liaison because they can filter out the bullshit jobs. People only get my number through referral, or if they've already hired me and I like them. It's not like we advertise in the yellow pages. And that's actually when you know that your foot's in the door—when jobs start coming in direct as well, and not just through your contact."

"So ... you just need to get a liaison to get you started?" Alden asked uncertainly.

"Or you could blindly stumble into some kind of big job and make a name for yourself that way." Lady knew that Dante had a liaison named Enzo, who she had never worked with or even met, but she still couldn't help but feel a little bitter. As terrible as it felt to talk about the events of Temen-ni-gru in this way, he had really gotten lucky in having taken credit for clearing that up. She had heard from another contact of hers that Dante had gotten a lot of jobs in the aftermath of the disaster, the government hiring him to take care of the large amount of demons that still lurked around the city while they were rebuilding it. It was almost unfair that he had gotten so easy of a start having been the only demon hunter in town, where she had had to build a reputation for herself as equally reliable, if not more careful.

"Sounds like I'll have to do just that." Alden laughed nervously, and there was something strangely pleasant about the laugh, emphasized by the fact that he had a lilting tenor.

"You already _have_ one, though. I mean, you found me through Grant, right?" She frowned when Alden nodded. "Then what's the issue? You managed to meet him, which is already a good sign since he can be a bit of a hardass. That, and he wouldn't have sent you to me if he didn't think you had any kind of potential."

"Yeah, I just..." he trailed off, looking down nervously. There was something oddly familiar about the expression on his face, something that made her think that not everything was what it seemed to be.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Lady quietly asked, leaning forward. She sighed as he mutely shook his head. "Well, let me know what I can do." She pulled out the notebook she usually carried with her and ripped out a page. "Let me give you my number, that way when you _do_ get that job lined up, I can tag along and give you tips." Usually she didn't give her number out to anyone, but there was something about the kid that she liked.

Alden looked up, his eyes shining proudly. "That would be _great_, _thank_ you."

* * *

"How did I do?" Alden nervously asked, bent over from physical exertion, a demon sprawled by his feet.

Lady paused to figure out how to phrase it. He hadn't done a _bad_ job of the mission—the demons were dead, nobody was harmed, and nothing had been damaged, which by her book meant that it had been a success—but his technique had been sloppy. Lady had ended up jumping in to make sure that he didn't get hurt more times than she would like to admit.

"You need to work on your shot, for starters," she answered, joining him where he stood. "You have a good eye, but I would _definitely_ invest in some more time at a shooting range just so you can get used to the basics. Once you get that down, the more complicated shots you kept trying will come more naturally to you. By the way—" She pulled out one of her guns. "—that demon's not dead yet."

Alden jumped as Lady fired down. He watched with wide eyes at the demon gurgled, then disappeared into a cloud of sand.

Despite her prompting Alden had remained tight-lipped with regards to why he had never called her about that first job. It was six months after their first meeting that he had finally given her a call, only because he had gotten a job—not through Grant as she would have assumed, but another contact named Henry Gaffin that she occasionally spoke to—and wanted her to come in as backup so she could observe him. A part of her wondered if he had wanted more time to get used to demon hunting before inviting her along for her to assess him, but from the way he refused to talk about it she also suspected that there was something else going on that he wasn't going to tell her. He kept secrets, which to her was very frustrating: she was curious to find out what made a nice, shy guy like _him_ decide that he wanted to go into demon hunting. She knew from experience that it was not a decision one made lightly.

"While you're at the range, you ought to ask about the advantages and disadvantages of each gun , because right now you aren't making the best of what you have," she continued, wiping her gun on her skirt before returning it to its holster. "And be sure to clean them tonight when you get home—clean them whenever you use them, because the last thing you want is for your gun to jam when you're on a job."

Alden nodded, still leaning over slightly to rest from the physical exertion. He was certainly in good physical shape; not built like Dante, but with wiry muscles that made her assume that he would be great at speed and evasion if he actually _tried_ to avoid attacks. Throughout most of the fight he had stayed put, trying to make what looked like informed, effective shots, but instead firing erratically, and in doing so leaving himself open to attack. From the way he held his stance, she imagined that he would be a very good sniper, crouched on a rooftop and picking off demons one by one. But he wasn't on a rooftop; he was in the fray, so he needed to learn how to fight aptly without allowing his nerves to overtake him. She had been shaken in her first fight as well even _with_ her formal training, but this was his fourth job, if what he hadn't been lying over the phone to her earlier that evening. He couldn't keep fighting the way he was fighting if he expected to live.

"Also, you should invest in some closer range weapons as well, in case you get jumped like this again," she added. She didn't expect him to use a big sword like Dante did—maybe just a knife of some kind. "I use bayonet fixtures on one of my guns as well as on Kalina Ann—" Here, she patted the missile launcher behind her. "—just in case anything gets too close and I can't reload, so I can stay protected. They're also good to tie into your fighting style—and speaking of which, you _need_ to work on your movement. If you haven't already, I suggest you learn some kind of martial art or hand-to-hand combat, because it really helps the way you maneuver during a fight, even if all you're using is guns."

"So ... you _don't_ expect me to punch the demons?" Alden joked.

"No, of course not," Lady replied, laughing lightly. While she had done so to get out of a tight situation once or twice, it wasn't something she did often. Not like Dante with those gauntlets of his. "But it's something worth learning."

Alden finally straightened, and Lady noticed for the first time that he had actually grown an inch since they had last seen each other about six months ago. It looked like his face had matured as well, which made her wonder: if he was still going through a growth spurt, how old was he? He might have been as young as she had been that night on Temen-ni-gru, but she felt uncomfortable asking the question, despite the fact that it was nothing to be nervous about.

He smiled lopsidedly, sweeping some of the dust off of his pants. "So what fighting style do _you_ know?" he asked.

"CQC, mainly—that's Close Quarters Combat—as well as some Muay Thai, which is a style of kickboxing" she answered. "I was also a gymnast as a kid, but I quit a long time ago. It helped with my balance and agility, so in hindsight I'm glad I did it, even though I hated it back then." She leaned back, and considered the question that he was bound to ask. "For you, I would say that you should look into some CQC, but supplement it with another martial art for some variety. Do some research, find a style and studio that you like, and you'll be fine."

"Can you teach me?" Alden suddenly asked.

Lady felt a cold chill pool in her solar plexus, running up her spine before settling in the base of her skull. _No_, she ... she didn't want to do anything like that. She wasn't _qualified_ to be a teacher of any kind, and she _certainly _didn't want a _protégé_ following her around and asking her for advice 24/7. A favor now and then she could do, but she didn't need this kid hanging off of her. At all. "Alden—" she nervously started.

"No, I get it," he interrupted, shrugging and turning away. "You don't want me hanging around you or anything. It's fine, I understand." His stance, particularly his shoulders, seemed very defeated. "Thank you for the help. I won't bother you anymore."

"Wait, I didn't _say_ that," Lady quickly corrected. She had _thought_ it, but she hadn't said it. "I ... I mean, I can give you _tips_ every now and then, but that's it." There was an uncomfortable pause in which Alden glanced over his shoulder at her before letting his gaze settle on a trash can to their right. "I would help you more, but I ... I kind of like to do my own thing," she added.

"Well, can we _ever_ work together, you and I?" Alden asked, glancing back at her again. His eyes, which normally did such a good job of showcasing his emotions, were heavily guarded. "Not just with you giving me advice, but the two of us kicking ass and taking names?"

"You mean like partners?" The chill rushed through her body again when he nodded. What was it that was making her so nervous? He was _just _asking to do more jobs with her, not to _date_ her. "I decided that I wouldn't be taking a partner any time soon," she admitted. "It's nothing personal—I _promise_. I said the same thing to Dante a while back." He didn't need to know that it wasn't necessarily flattering to be compared to Dante from her perspective, but if it helped to ease the rejection, then she was willing to use it.

"You _know_ Dante?" Alden exclaimed excitedly, rushing towards her with a sudden explosion of energy that surprised her considerably. Now _that _was a switch. "Well I guess that's not too surprising, since the three of us are the only hunters in town... What's he like? Is he nice?"

"He's ... strong," Lady said, trying to avoid all other qualifying adjectives for him, like "arrogant," "idiotic," "perverted," and— "And nice, when he wants to be," she added, deciding that she could give the demon a bit more credit.

"Do you think you can introduce me to him?" Alden nearly turned red as he asked the question—she forgot how easily he got flustered, and thought it strangely cute. "He's _really_ cool and it would be great to meet him and ask _him_ a few questions as well."

"We're ... not exactly on speaking terms," she admitted. No, they were apparently just in hold-her-in-his-arms terms. There was a reason why she had stayed away from him after that night a little over a year ago and rebuffed all of his friendly advances: she didn't want to deal with anyone on a closer personal basis. It was as simple as that. She didn't need anyone, and to be honest, she was surprised that anyone—in this case, Alden—would need her for anything. "But who knows," she added when she noticed the forlorn expression on the boy's face, "once you start making a name for yourself, you might get called on the same job as him. I've had that happen several times."

"Yeah, but you're actually _good_ at demon hunting. Like, _really_ good. I'm not." Alden frowned, brown eyes dull. "Henry mentioned that you were _also_ there on T-Night..."

"Oh, that." Lady sighed, shifting her shoulders uncomfortably—they were a little tense for some reason.

"Weren't you scared?" Alden quietly asked.

"Loath as I am to admit it, yes," she said, smiling cryptically. "But I had my reasons for being there." She shifted her shoulders again, still feeling tense. "What about you? Why are _you_ doing this?"

"Your missile launcher strap," Alden said abruptly.

"What?" What did that have to do with anything? Was he dodging her question again?

"The strap. It's loose," he explained, pointing to the strap in question. "Do you want me to fix the strap for you so you don't have to?"

"Oh, sure," Lady answered dumbly, more than a little disappointed in the fact that he wasn't answering her question again. This time her transition had been so _seamless_, instead of the more direct approach she had previously used. The fact that he was avoiding the topic was more than a little frustrating.

"Right here, right?" he asked, indicating the clasp with his finger. When she nodded, Alden quickly reached forward, hooking his arms around her shoulders and leaning in to tighten the strap. His body was nearly flush with hers and face mere inches from her ear, eyes downcast and framed by surprisingly long lashes, and a light pink dusting over his cheeks and nose. She faintly heard the sound of his heart pounding in his chest, and surprisingly felt hers pounding as well.

"Perfect, stop," she quietly said when the strap of Kalina Ann felt comfortable again. She felt her own face heating up as well, wondering why _she_ was blushing too. The last time she had blushed, she had still been—

Alden rested his hand on her shoulder and angled his face towards hers. She saw the flecks of gold in his warm brown eyes, warm and dark and confusing all at once—and then they grew closer as he pressed a light kiss to the corner of her mouth. It lasted for two seconds at most, but there seemed to be as much feeling in that fraction of a kiss as in the desperate, tear-stained ones that Mary had shared with David about seven years earlier.

Then he was several steps away from her, flustered and gangly and an awkward teenager once more, instead of ... well, _whoever_ it was, in her mind, that could lean in and press meaningful kisses to the corner of her lips and make her almost want to kiss back.

"I'm sorry," Alden apologized, looking at the floor at her feet instead of at her as he spoke. "The moment felt right."

It _had_ been right, she wanted to say, but the moment had passed as quickly as it had arrived. "_I'm_ sorry," Lady insisted. "I mentioned before, I'm just ... I work alone. I'm..." She trailed off. It was the wrong time for her, and to be honest she knew it was the wrong person as well. Alden was a nice boy, but there was something lacking in him that she couldn't really place. Maybe it was because he was a young boy infatuated with an older woman. He was ... what, sixteen? She had recently turned twenty-two. It was _weird_.

"I understand," Alden said lightly, looking up at him with a guarded look in his eyes. "Don't feel pressured into doing anything that you don't want to do."

Lady smirked. She wasn't a kid anymore—she didn't succumb to peer pressure.

"But don't close yourself off _completely_," he continued, smiling lopsidedly again. "If I call you and you don't already have a job, will you go with me? Let me know how I'm doing?"

Well, it was the least she could do. Besides, she wanted to protect him, or at least make sure that he would end up strong enough to protect himself. He was only a _boy_. "Yeah, I can do that," she promised, smiling.

"Good." Alden's lopsided smile turned into a grin, but his eyes were still veiled. She just wished she could understand what he was really thinking, because suddenly it was a lot harder to do. "Now let's get out of here—this place kind of weirds me out."

* * *

Lady worked with Alden several times in the ensuing months, all cases in which he called her up and asked her to tag along . While she could tell from his improvements that he had been taking her advice to good use, there was still something lacking in his technique that she could never really place. She realized that she would never choose to split up on a job with him the way that she did on a job with Dante, if only because she worried that he would get hurt without her to keep an eye on him. Besides, she avoided Dante because he made her feel uneasy—granted, Alden made her feel uneasy as well, but in a different way.

Whatever secrets he had he still refused to divulge. Whatever he still thought about her he refused to say, or even to let his warm brown eyes say it for him. Lady felt herself wondering who this Alden Sinclair guy was, and why a nice boy like him had gotten himself into something like demon hunting. At the end of each mission, she wondered if she would actually see him again. Maybe he would get killed by demons, either on his way home or afterwards, on another job where she wasn't there to save him. Or maybe he would be okay and life a long, happy life in a peaceful, demon-free suburb with a completely normal wife and children. All options involved him never reaching out to her again.

Maybe that would be best for him—the one where he escaped with his life, of course—but maybe it would be best for her too. It was her job to fight demons. That didn't leave a lot of time for anything else.


	11. The Blanket

This was one of the first chapter ideas that I ever came up with for _Ephemerality_. It was one of the few moments where I knew what it was that Lady was thinking—the rest of the time I had and idea, but here I knew the exact things that came up in her head. I've since added one or two things, but it's nice to finally get this one on the page. It's short, but it does exactly what I need it to do.

**Anonymous:** Yeah, Dante would have laughed his ass off—like: "Haha, _this_ is my competition?" Uh, on second thought, better that he never really found out, right? And because I never revealed it in-chapter, I'll tell you here: Alden goes on a job as usual, finishes the job despite a really severe injury, and dies after he brings himself into the emergency room. Not a particularly heroic or tragic death, which I find rather suitable for him. Oh, poor Alden.

**KuteInsanity:** Good to know it was all convincing despite my lack of foresight—it all worked out in the end, so I'm not complaining. I kind of feel bad about how much I ended up limiting the reveal of information, at least in the sense that Lady never got to find out what made Alden tick. Unfortunately she'll never end up finding out, despite her curiosity. As for this chapter ... it's a scene that you've already seen, and I wouldn't call it fluffy, but Dante was completely oblivious to Lady's inner monologue during this section, which I had fairly fleshed out while writing the original chapter. Good times.

**zenbon zakura:** What, for kissing her? Hah, yeah, so did I when I first decided that Alden was going to kind of kiss her, and then when I got to that part, Lady was actually strangely okay with it...

The next few chapters are pretty much just other little "moments" that take place in the time that Dante and Lady worked together (covered in II.3: Pax Romana). I currently don't have any plans to go back and look at any of those specific scenes, and am instead focusing on a few other things that happened then. If you _do_ want to see something specific from that chapter retold from Lady's POV, please let me know! The only thing I won't write is about the date that was mentioned at the end of the chapter—nothing really happened, I promise you.

Unfortunately I also have really big writer's block, which is why this chapter is late in the first place... I'll update ASAP. D: And is it just me, or can nobody else upload documents today? I had to paste the text of this chapter into a document I had already uploaded. DUDE. WTF.

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case II.2) of _The Passage of Time_!**

* * *

**Ephemerality**

_10: The Blanket_

(corresponds to a moment in II.2: Unforeseen Circumstances)

Of all the times to make a stupid mistake, Lady _had_ to do it when Dante was with her. In the past few years, she had stopped getting injured on jobs, completing them with a keen professionalism that she hadn't yet developed while fighting her way through Temen-ni-gru. Of course, the times that Dante was around were the ones where she seemed to hurt herself so he could swoop in like the gallant knight and protect her from the terrible dragon.

The bastard. She didn't need his help. She didn't need his pity. And she didn't need a place to sleep on his couch.

She did, however, need to ice her ankle.

Devil May Cry was about as dirty as it had been the first time she had been over—it looked like Hurricane Frat Boy had swept through the room and left in its wake a slew of cans and pizza boxes. The kitchen was a little better, at least in the sense that a giant mold monster didn't attack her as soon as she entered the room, but it was in desperate need to be wiped down. She dared venture into the freezer to fortunately find some ice, albeit surrounded by what looked like enough liquor bottles to stock a full-sized bar, and stole most of them from the tray to wrap in a paper towel.

Hearing Dante approaching her, she glanced over to find the demon with blankets in his arms, staring at her in slight confusion. She understood why he might have been confused, since less than a half hour earlier she was fighting him about going back to his office, and now it looked like she was raiding his fridge. "Ice," Lady bluntly offered, lifting her hand to reveal her makeshift ice pack.

Dante nodded before indicating the blankets in his arms with a smooth tilt of his head. "I got you blankets," he explained. "Figured you'd rather stay on the couch than in my bed."

Lady stifled a laugh, glad that she did because she could tell that it would have been a barking laugh. She wasn't even sure why it was that funny—was it supposed to be a joke? It did seem a little bit laden with self-deprecation, and it was that and the underlying truth that seemed to make it so funny. After all, there was no _way_ she would ever do that. No, she couldn't. Still, she wanted to hide the fact that she thought his comment was funny, instead calmly saying: "You guessed right," as she closed the freezer door and limped back into the main room, Dante following behind her.

She stretched herself out onto the sofa, wincing as she had to moved her foot to elevate it. She immediately placed her makeshift ice pack on the sore ankle, grateful the immediate chill against the offending joint. When she was done, Dante gingerly handing her the pile of blankets. "You sure you don't want to see a doctor about that?" he asked for what must have been the tenth time that night. His concern was certainly more annoying than it was endearing.

"Not for a twisted ankle, no," she plainly answered as she unfolded one of the two blankets he had brought her. The first was a quilt made of bright-colored patches—she found herself absently running a finger along the bright blue stitching. "For someone who gets injured so often, you sure know nothing about basic first aid," she commented. She remembered the way he had watched her dress her wound on the Tower as well, clearly unsure of what she had to do but fascinated by the very concept of disinfecting a cut. She was surprised that he hadn't died from a severe infection at this rate.

"Ever notice how quickly I heal, though?" Dante asked, wryly crossing his arms. She wanted to scowl at him and remind him of how hard it had been to kill him the night of Temen-ni-gru, and she had tried _very_ hard.

Suddenly, Lady felt very uncomfortable. She had tried to _kill_ him. Of course it had made _sense_ the night of, and even in a few of the ensuing years, but now? She hadn't even thought about it in years. Dante was still a demon—that obviously hadn't changed—but for some reason she balked at the idea of ever having to kill the man or demon or _whoever_ that she had somehow managed to grow used to. The idea that she had once tried doing so made her feel uneasy. She could have killed him! He hadn't died, of course, but that hadn't stopped her from trying.

The fact that she felt bad about nearly killing a demon was more than a little disconcerting. This was her _job_.

"It's always been like that," Dante continued, apparently not noticing the stony expression that had crossed her face. "I never had to worry when I got hurt because it'd get better really quickly."

"Must have been hard to explain that to the other kids in the playground," Lady joked uncomfortably. Oh, why had she even said that? To stave off any kind of guilty silence, she guessed, but at the same time she didn't know anything about his childhood. A part of her imagined that he might have lived amongst humans—after all, despite not having a human physiology, he had captured the mannerisms perfectly—so how would he have ever been able to explain the fact that he couldn't get hurt to everyone else? Dante had likely been the type of kid who thrust himself into dangerous situations, challenging all of the other boys to arm wrestling matches or whatever it was that little boys did. Plus if what he had seen of his relationship with Vergil had been of any indication, the two boys had probably not gotten along so well.

But why was she even thinking about such things? He was a demon. He was a _demon_. He...

"Didn't have to," Dante responded. "Vergil and I were home-schooled."

Something seemed to shift in the room. Dante's expression went from genial to startled, seemingly surprised by the fact that he had even divulged such information. Lady herself felt something in her blood run cold, lowering the blanket in her hands as she realized that her earlier suspicions were somewhat confirmed. An unsettling pause followed.

He _had_ lived among humans, and guessed that he had also lived _as_ a human. The nature vs. nurture discussion of her high school psychology class sprang to mind as she began applying that very same reasoning to the man in front of her. In high school, Mary had argued that you were what you were and that was that, mainly in that personality was hereditary, and that people would ultimately return to their genetically inscribed traits despite any changes they might have tried to make. It was a strangely narrow opinion for someone with a fairly bright view of the world, but suited Mary rather well, given the fact that she had once seen the world as continuous and unchanging.

She supposed that Mary hadn't known much of the world. Sometimes Good Father wasn't really Good Father and Bright Future wasn't really Bright Future; sometimes the shadows hid demons and the human heart hid more dark ambition than she felt comfortable admitting. Who was to say that a demon couldn't learn humanity, even if it was against his instincts? She had already known that he was a little bit special, having seen his capacity for tears the night that she had met him, as well as a sympathetic side that probably beat her own hardened sense of compassion. As much as she wanted to continue believing, as always, that he was a demon he was a demon and she would kill the demon, Lady knew that it was suddenly a lot more complicated than that. She also thought it was strange that her Inner Mary was the one who was arguing so adamantly against his humanity, where Lady, who she has assumed had long since lost the capacity to trust someone, was the one who was defending Dante.

Dante's eyes were probing her for information, asking questions that she couldn't quite understand. It seemed as though he expected something from her—did he want her to ask any more questions? She wasn't sure. She didn't plan on it.

Lady's eyes returned to the blanket on her lap, scrutinizing the occasionally uneven stitches and making a note of the faded patches. There was one little area where the sewing machine made a jagged line, before going over the spot again several times. It made the blanket seem more human, and somehow added to his own humanity. She never imagined that she would ever give him this much credit; it made her squirm.

"It's late," she said, still looking down at the blanket. She noticed a little ball of fuzz and picked it off. "And I'm tired. I should sleep."

"It's cool," Dante casually answered, taking a few easy steps back towards the stairwell that presumably went up to his bedroom. Whatever that moment was, it had passed, and yet there still seemed to be some residual awkwardness. "I'll be upstairs if you need me," he offered.

"I'll be fine," she responded, smiling politely. She couldn't shake from her mind the image of a beautiful woman in a suburban home with long silver hair and bright blue eyes sitting at a sewing machine, a pile of quilt patches on the table next to her, all in bright primary colors, occasionally glancing out of the window to see her two young sons wrestle in the backyard, bathed in warm sunlight. Lady unfolded the other blanket, a green flannel one, and covered the sentimental blanket. "Night."

"Night," Dante said, turning away to start his trek upstairs. He stopped at the foot of the stairs and added, already one step up: "Bathroom's—"

"In the back, I see it," Lady interrupted. She kind of wanted this conversation to end.

"Okay," Dante added, and after a brief pause started climbing up. Lady stole a brief look at his retreating form before glancing down at the corner of the quilt that was still visible, almost smiling at the red and blue pattern around the border. By the time she looked up again, the hem of his red coat was just slipping out of sight.

Lady definitely wasn't tired enough to go to bed immediately: her mind was racing. With a sigh, she pushed the blankets off of herself to readjust the ice pack on her ankle, the melt dampening the sofa and blanket. Her ankle was hurting her pretty badly, but it was fairly superficial. It was more like she hit it at the right place than anything else, thankfully not breaking the bone but still causing a lot of pain. She was pretty confident that she would be able to leave the next morning without too much trouble, and if she kept off her foot for another day she would be back to normal. As much as she had fought the offer, maybe she _was_ grateful that Dante had offered to put her up for the night, just because she worried about traveling back home with her ankle in this much pain.

It was time to start rethinking a lot of the decisions that she had once made. She was _already_ thanking herself for accepting Dante's offer of help tonight, help that she previously would have laughed at, and she was beginning to wonder if her lone wolf approach to everything was insufficient. After all, that job, injury excluded, had gone remarkably well, and it had been a little comforting to fight alongside another demon hunter who _wasn't_ Alden, who could take care of himself without her watchful eye but appreciated the cover regardless. _She_ appreciated the cover, because her line of work had suddenly gotten more fatal.

The thought of Alden's death still made her stomach churn. She had been _right_ about him, unfortunately in the way that she had hoped wouldn't be the case. While she knew that none of it was her fault, she still couldn't help but feel guilty about his death, as if she had the power to stop him and had failed to do so. As much as it hurt to admit it, there was a chance that he might have still been alive if she had given his offer to work together more consideration. Instead he was ... well, she wasn't sure how he had died, but she could only hope that it had been painless, and that it hadn't been in vain.

Who was to say that she didn't need to same treatment? Without Dante's help tonight, that demon might have killed _her_ too.

Maybe it would be best if she worked with Dante. It wasn't to satisfy any other curiosities about his past, as for the sake of her peace of mind she would rather be unaware of whatever it was that _made_ him Dante and instead just accepting the demon-man for who he was, as strange as it sounded. No, she needed to protect herself from the same fate that Alden had met, and the best way to do that was to make sure that someone was watching her back when she was unable to, like tonight. Besides, from a business standpoint, it would be a fantastic venture. Dante had already long since proven his worth as a demon hunter, and together they would have a monopoly on the entire demon hunting trade in the area, since there was nobody else to stand in their way. It was a good way of making sure that the jobs would go to them and them alone.

Mary seemed to be warning her about this, telling her that she was making a mistake and was better off finding partnership or friendship in someone else. Mary would have chosen Alden for such things anyway since he was aggressively normal enough for her tastes, but Alden was dead.

For a moment, she wondered if she was doomed to watch the people close to her die before realizing that Dante wouldn't die. She had seen that for herself.

Lady would have to sleep on it. She would curl herself up in Dante's childhood blanket, wrapped in his memories whether or not he was aware that he had left them there for her, and contemplate opening herself up to this strange, humanlike demon. Alden would have been proud of her, even though he had been referring to himself while telling her that she shouldn't close herself off from other people. After all, Alden had thought Dante was just about the coolest thing ever.

Thinking back to the fierce look on Dante's face as he ripped through the Vanguard, eyes drifting shut to welcome what would be uneasy, quarrelsome sleep, Lady found herself vaguely agreeing.


	12. Dante 3

Hey folks! Sorry about the delay—not only was this chapter giving me a lot of trouble, but I went back to school and had to move into my new apartment. (Yikes, I'm a senior!) Then there was the matter of trying to build back the buffer chapter that I had used last week when I was failing ... I hope this makes up for the wait. Meanwhile, have some responses!

**Bakabara**: Heh, I kind of loved that part too. It was actually so cathartic to write that section, just because when I originally wrote it in _PoT_ I knew what Lady was thinking, so writing it down was kind or epic. And I'm glad Alden served his purpose well—that was what I was going for, so I'm glad it worked.

**Anonymous**: We're going to continue to explore that theme for the next few chapters, since Lady is trying to figure this out for herself. And poor Alden indeed ... I almost regretted killing him off! And the drinking contest... You mean the scene where they're sitting around drinking and chatting, or the one where Dante gets really drunk and starts saying too much? The latter is definitely coming up, and while I hadn't planned to write the former, it actually comes after this chapter so I can still write it, if you want to see it.

**Eric Draven 201**: Thank you! I'm glad you're enjoying that dynamic, since it's such a crucial part of their relationship. I hope you continue to enjoy them!

**Pink Priestess**: Lol Dante _does_ make everything better...

**KuteInsanity**: Her feeling guilty was actually kind of spur of the moment! When the thought came up I _had_ to include it somehow, seeing as she had kind of felt guilty in the first place before finding out he was a demon—her thoughts came full circle. I'm so sorry for the delay with this chapter, by the way, but I hope the new content will make up for the wait!

Anyway, this is first of two vignettes that I had planned for the Pax Romana section—a scene that I never really alluded to in the original story but _definitely_ needed to happen. The next planned chapter (subject to change if someone requests a vignette, as after that one I'm writing about the events that led up to Lady leaving) is called "Lust," and comes with this rather amusing summary: "Trashy. Bimbo. Skank."

Oh, and a slight warning for drug references. I do NOT advocate the use of cocaine.

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case II.3) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

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**Ephemerality**

_11: Dante 3_

(corresponds to a moment hidden amidst the events of II.3: Pax Romana)

Lady had quickly learned that it was the supposedly routine missions that ended up being the most annoying. A group of demons was never _just_ a group of demons—it was a _large_ group of demons. If Enzo or Grant told them that the mission would be "simple enough," they knew to pack extra ammunition. The more innocuous-sounding the mission, the more it would be a huge pain in the ass that would lead to one of them, usually Dante, getting injured, or taking a million years to finish, or getting skimped on payment, or something to that extent.

It was never worth the trouble, but it seemed as though more and more lately the only jobs that were coming in were the ones that had them groaning in frustration. The past year had been riddled with far too many demons playing hide-and-seek and ambushes by powerful demons for their taste. The classic show-up-and-kills were getting more and more rare, and when they did happen there tended to be a rather inordinate amount of demons to get rid of, just like the first time they had worked together on that job in the freighter. They were both beginning to wonder where the normal missions had gone—Lady had suggested that maybe they had done enough damage to the amount of demons in the Human World that all that was left was the annoying missions.

Dante had shaken his head. "No," he answered, uncharacteristically sage, "I think they've just figured out that we're a threat."

Over a year after they had started working together, Lady realized that Dante was starting to grow on her, and not just as a good hunting partner. She enjoyed his company for the most part, laughed at his jokes, and while she still thought his office was an absolute _sty_ and did her best to clean it when she could, didn't mind spending time there. There were always some bumps in the road—like their constant arguing and the fact that he was an arrogant little shit half of the time—but she would be lying if she said that she didn't find his personality oddly infectious. It was as if a weight was slowly being lifted off of her shoulders as she began adopting the same laissez-faire attitude that made him Dante.

Not that she would admit it, of course. For her own sense of pride, she kept the same cold mask that she had grown so used to and relishing in their arguments as a way of maintaining distance between them. She allowed the little moments of his inconsideration to get to her far more than they normally would, just so she could shrug off his kindness and insist that they're better off not trying to be buddy-buddy. She still wasn't so sure she could trust him, even though he had tried to convince her a countless number of times that he was trustworthy. After all, Dante was still a demon, though she was beginning to question what that meant exactly when he was so different from the monsters they killed on jobs.

The night that Enzo called with the job: "Demon in a warehouse. Doesn't sound too bad," Dante and Lady had rolled their eyes, wordlessly agreeing that this job, like many others, would be _such_ bullshit. Lady definitely wondered if the liaisons did this on purpose—grossly misinforming them of the job to come, if not underestimating it completely, as if the two demon hunters would refuse a job if it sounded too hard. Yeah, sure. If anything, the added difficulty added a little spice to the jobs; what was annoying was the guessing game of will-it-be-good-or-a-pain-in-the-ass. There was no way of telling.

When they pulled up to the warehouse in question, Lady couldn't help but turn to Dante with an incredibly bored look and state the obvious: "Fifty bucks says this job is more trouble than it's worth."

"Hell no, I'm not betting against that," he answered, removing Rebellion from his back and giving it a test spin. Dante had also brought that electric guitar with him, Nevan—the one that Lady swore she heard laughing derisively whenever she walked past it. Dante had mentioned something about how many of his weapons used to be demons, which she had found slightly disturbing, if only because she wondered what kind of weapon Dante would be.

"Just trying to make things interesting," Lady noted, stretching her neck a little to loosen it. "Although maybe you _should_ take the bet. If you win, I'll call it even—you still owe me fifty bucks from the last bet."

"Yeah, I'll pay you back when the job's over," Dante half-heartedly promised. He was staring at the warehouse near them, frowning lightly as his eyes skimmed over its surface. "_This_ is the place, right?"

"Yeah," Lady answered, leaning against her bike, watching him curiously. He seemed a little concerned for some reason, which would have made her worried if she hadn't been feeling the same thing. "Enzo also mentioned that there's delicate cargo in there, and we're getting docked for whatever gets destroyed."

"That's bullshit: we can't help it if the demon's already destroyed shit in there," he protested, glancing back at her with an annoyed look on his face

"I know, but that's part of the deal," she explained, sighing lightly as she spoke. "Client's willing to pay a lot to make sure that everything's safe, but by the same token he won't pay as much if his merchandise gets destroyed."

"Did Enzo mention the guy's name?" Dante asked, focusing his attention on the warehouse again, his eyes once again scrutinizing it. She wished that her senses were as strong as his, because he clearly sensed something in there that she couldn't.

"No, the client wished to remain anonymous." Lady smirked, straightening and taking a few steps forward to stand next to him. "I bet it's drugs."

"If it's the case we should take some for ourselves," Dante offered with a mischievous grin on his face. He angled his face to look down at her, adding: "What do you say?"

Lady snorted. "I say that we'd get charged for it in the end. Come on, let's get this over with." With that she started walking forward, stifling another snort as she heard him add behind her: "He wouldn't have to find out!"

Dante quickly joined her, and they entered the warehouse together, both scanning the space for whatever demon was apparently terrorizing the area. A year or so earlier, she would have told Dante to go one way while she went another so that she could avoid him, but it wasn't a technique she would suggest anymore. While it did have its merits—for instance, covering the space in half that time that it would take them to do it together—she didn't feel the need to avoid Dante anymore, nor did she want to split up when she had no idea what they were up again. "Demon in a warehouse" could mean so many things.

"Doesn't look like anything got wrecked," Dante said with some relief. "Not up here, anyway."

"Let's hope the rest of the warehouse looks this good." Lady rolled her neck again, surprised by how stiff it was. When she got that fifty dollars back from Dante, she was using the money to get a massage. "Come on, let's find this fucker."

With that, they wordlessly started exploring the warehouse. Lady was surprised that Dante _wasn't_ saying anything—usually he filled the professional silence with some unprofessional attempts at conversation. Lately she had taken to conversing back with him, filling up what she used to consider a comfortable silence with conversation, though she wasn't sure why. Maybe it was because Dante tended to make some fairly amusing comments, and on frustrating missions like these she could use a good laugh, even if she tried to muffle it each time with a few notable exceptions.

After several minutes of walking, Dante finally spoke: "I bet it's _cocaine_."

"Cocaine?" Lady repeated, bemused. "Do you _see_ how many boxes there are?"

"Yeah, so?" Dante asked, shrugging.

"If there is cocaine in the boxes, then that's far more cocaine than I ever want to imagine," she responded, shaking her head. "I don't think there's even this much cocaine in the United States."

It was Dante's turn to stifle a laugh. "_Clearly_ you don't know anything about cocaine."

"And you do?" Lady asked, frowning lightly as she spoke. When Dante looked away and shrugged noncommittally, her eyes widened. "_Dante_!"

"I've done it once or twice, it's no big deal," he explained, shrugging his shoulders as he spoke. "But the few times I did ... let me tell you, you don't really do a _small_ amount of cocaine." He glanced down at her again, and noticing the strange look on her face, added: "What?"

"I took you for the partying type, but cocaine is pretty _strong_," she admitted. Lady enjoyed her fair share of alcoholic beverages and the occasional cigarette, but steered clear of the harder drugs—they had never really been her kind of thing. Dante, with his inhuman healing abilities, probably wouldn't feel narcotics the same way that a human would and probably wouldn't get addicted to anything, but at the same time it was a little jarring to hear him admit that he had even tried. It seemed a little unprofessional for a demon hunter to risk messing up his system that way, even if he wouldn't really feel it.

"I haven't done it in _years_," he said a little defensively. "Besides, I prefer drinking."

Lady laughed. "_There's_ something I can agree with."

Dante opened his mouth as if to say something, but instead stopped short and shot his arm out to stop her as well. Before she could ask him what that was for—particularly with his hand so close to her chest, which she had to admit made her feel pretty uncomfortable—he pointed to a small creature lurking ahead of them, sniffing a crate curiously. It was probably about the size of a pig and looked like the cross between that, a lion, and an armadillo, with a prominent snout, glinting tusks, round armored body, sharp claws, and a long, forked tail. But it was _tiny_. Other than being strange looking, it looked fairly innocuous, or as Enzo had said: "Not too bad."

"_That's_ it?" Lady whispered, almost laughing. "You should have taken the bet, Dante."

That was when she noticed that Dante didn't look so amused—quite the opposite, in fact. His skin, which usually had the healthy glow of a strong young man in his twenties, had gone utterly pale, his mouth pressed into a thin line. If Lady had known any better, she would have guessed that he seemed a little scared, or at the very least utterly perturbed by the turn of events, and she was pretty sure it had nothing to do with the fifty dollars he could have made.

"What?" Lady asked, beginning to get a little concerned as well due to the look on Dante's face. After all, it took a lot to faze him.

Dante looked down at her, his eyes a strange color. "The last time I saw one of those, there was only one way I could beat it," he explained, "and it's not something I particularly want to do."

Somehow, Lady didn't like the sound of that sentence, though she couldn't place why—she shrugged it off, blaming it, once again, on his oddly infectious personality. "You were by yourself last time," she argued, trying extra hard to be the composed one between the two of them. "It'll be easier now that there are two of us."

Dante narrowed his eyes, staring at the demon again. "I hope you're right."

"Besides," she added with a laugh. "It's tiny. It can't be _that_ bad."

He slowly shook his head. "It's not tiny," he cryptically said.

"What?" she asked, confused. As if on cue, the demon popped its head up, inhuman white eyes staring up at them in bewilderment before making a shrill sound and, of all things, _expanding_. Lady could only watch in horror as the demon grew to a larger size, knocking over crates to accommodate for the lack of space. To her left, Dante looked as grim as ever, for some reason unnerved when he usually never allowed the demons that they saw on jobs to faze him.

When the demon was done growing, it was the size of a semi.

"Dante," Lady hissed, getting the other's attention. "We try it _my_ way first, and _then_ we'll do it your way." When Dante nodded cheerlessly, she said: "The armor's on the top, so his underside is probably weaker. Aim there."

Ignoring the contradictory look on his face, Lady sprung forward, quickly whipping out her two handguns and firing at the demon's underside. She would have loved to use Kalina Ann in this situation, since it would be so much more effective against a larger demon than bullets, but with the threat of docked pay for collateral damage, she didn't want to do anything _else_ to destroy the cargo when the damn demon was already doing it for them. Rebellion would probably be their most effective weapon, she realized as Dante shook off whatever was bothering him and joined her.

It didn't take long for her to realize that the soft underbelly of the beast was not all that soft. Cursing inwardly, she attempted to shift her aim towards the mouth and eyes, but it was moving around too much for her to get a good shot. She noticed Dante executing his usual forceful attacks against the demons side, and while the blows landed and cut through the armor and into the flesh, the demon immediately healed before he could repeat the action. Nothing was _working_. It seemed as though their only choice was for Dante to do whatever it was he didn't want to do, and she wasn't so sure she wanted to ask him to do so. Not yet—not when she still had Kalina Ann.

Conveniently, the demon stopped its violent thrashing and faced her. She grinned: she could end it if she could just get it in the eyes, and fuck it she was going to do so with Kalina Ann. It was as Lady aimed her shot that she learned that the demon could also breathe fire.

"Shit!" she shouted as she jumped out of the way of a blast of fire from the demon's mouth. She could only watch in horror as the crates that had been behind her caught fire.

"How much money did we just lose from that?" Dante asked, suddenly appearing behind her.

"Too much," Lady lamented, watching whatever it had been inside—cocaine or otherwise—burn up. That was probably worth a few hundred dollars from their paycheck.

She couldn't risk using Kalina Ann when she could only attack before the fire breath, lest she blow up any crates with a poorly aimed missile. And since Dante's attacks weren't doing much good either if the demon could immediately heal, well ... they had no choice.

"I'll draw his attention while you try to take it down doing whatever it is you did last time," she instructed. "And _don't_ fight me on this; you'll be more effective than I'll ever be short of using Kalina Ann, which I can't do with all these crates around."

Dante shook his head and swung Rebellion over his shoulder. "Well, I don't feel comfortable using you as bait," he told her, face guarded, "but you're not gonna give me any other choices, are you."

"No," she obstinately answered.

"Then I don't have any other choice." He lowered Rebellion from his shoulder and cast her a wary glance. "Just keep your eyes on the demon. Don't let me distract you or you'll get hurt."

"Okay," Lady agreed, though her curiosity was now piqued. What could make the usually audacious Dante so apprehensive?

They both charged forward again, Dante running around the demon as Lady once again headed towards the creature's face. She decided not to fire quickly and hastily but instead take careful shots, since there was no point in wasting bullets if none of them would work anyway. Their plan seemed to be working: her careful fire was just enough to draw the demon's attention, so Dante would be able to take it by surprise and do whatever it was he clearly didn't want to do.

The question was: where was he?

There was a flash of white, and the red blurs as a series of cuts appeared along the demon's flesh. Before the first could heal, a second would appear, and then a third, deepening the lacerations, almost as if they were digging deeper and deeper towards the demon's inside. As ... well, kind of _gross_ of a technique as it was, it was working very well because Dante was able to move so quickly. Why did he have such a problem doing whatever it was he had to do when it was working so well?

That was when she saw that the red didn't come from Dante's coat, but his skin. His _scales_.

Lady stopped dead. She found herself remembering the old stories of ethereally beautiful demons with terrible strength, able to take down whole armies with one swipe of their sword. Dante, for all that she found him to be unrefined and obnoxious at times, had epitomized the myths, not only due to his strength, but also his elegant white—albeit messy—hair and exceptional blue eyes, effortlessly muscular physique, and shining white teeth despite the amount of junk that he ate. Even when he walked downstairs after just rolling out of bed, which was often the case, he always looked incredibly attractive, which set him apart from both the hideous demonic rabble and humans like herself, who woke up with bags under their eyes and needed to brush their teeth and work out to look good.

But he had a demon form too. His soft white hair had morphed into bizarre horns, blue eyes turned yellow, and teeth gone sharp, as if he could rip through any kind of flesh with a single bite. Hands and feet were now claws, and fabric had become scaly skin, emulating his human form while still being entirely different. She found herself missing the smooth yet masculine lines of his face, the rustle of red leather, the way he gritted his teeth as he made a devastating blow, and the little glint in his eyes as he shot her a satisfied look despite the fact that he was covered in dust or blood or something else that she didn't really want to identify.

This wasn't Dante. It couldn't be. He was _different_ than the demons she hunted and killed—she had finally accepted that, so why did he have to show her that maybe he wasn't so different after all?

"Lady?"

She snapped to attention when she heard Dante's decidedly human voice trying to get her attention. Somewhere down the line, he had killed the demon, whose carcass was fading to dust right behind him. Dante himself had returned to his human form, white hair glistening pristinely, red leather billowing around him as his eyes whispered apologies that she wasn't even sure that he had to make. "Sorry," he seemed to be saying. "Sorry for not being a human."

"Good job," Lady said, forcing a smile. "Hopefully we won't lose too much money for all of the cargo that was destroyed."

Dante stood silently for a moment, watching her curiously. It was as if he wanted to ask her if she had seen him, seen the side of him that he had obviously not wanted to show her, but wasn't sure if it was right to ask to obvious question. Lady herself was struggling to decide if she needed to confirm that the dumb look on her face was due to her having seen the monstrous devil form, and that it _had_ scared her, but that she was okay with it, because he was still Dante. He was a demon; he had a demon form, no big deal. The bomb dropping wasn't as calamitous as it would have been if she hadn't known he was a demon at all. It was just a little _jarring_ to see it for the first time.

She wondered when it had become okay to think this way. Mary would have been freaking out by now. To be honest, she _was_ freaking out a little, but at the same time it just affirmed the fact that while he was different from demons, he was also different from humans. His fear, though, had been most intriguing. Why would a guy as cocksure as Dante be so scared of showing off an ability that made him an even stronger fighter?

She never planned on asking him that question. As curious as she was, there were certain things that a person just couldn't ask.

"God, this job was a pain in the ass," Lady commented, trying to fill the uncomfortable silence between them. "I could use a drink right about now."

"Yeah," Dante responded, laughing uncomfortably. "Me too."

Maybe she should buy him a drink some time, to make up for the countless times he tried to ask her out for drinks and she said no. If alcohol was a mutual friend, then ... well, maybe this demon-not-demon-human-looking-handsome-monster was worth getting to know a little better. They didn't have to be best friends or anything—she just wanted to expand on the camaraderie they had already begun to share, because she enjoyed that on a superficial level at the very least.

That seemed to be the cue for them both to leave—she didn't want to be around the rapidly decomposing corpse of that disgusting demon anyway, and instead wanted to go back to Devil May Cry with the demon that she might have wanted to be her friend.

"Hey, I think it really _is_ cocaine!" Dante exclaimed as they left, pointing to a smashed open crate with perhaps _too_ much excitement for someone who claimed not to have done the drug in years.

This time, Lady didn't stifle her laugh.


	13. Lust

Sometimes _PoT_ and _Ephemerality_ are angsty. And sometimes Lady gets snarky, and we get to have a bit more fun. ...okay maybe this chapter isn't entirely free of its bullshit, since I'm using it to show the less happy side of Dante and Lady's early friendship. (After all, Dante is a bit of an unreliable narrator—things weren't necessarily as "okay" from Lady's side as he might have thought.) At the same time, writing out "Trashy Bimbo Skank" each time was incredibly fun. ILU, Lady.

Thank you for the reviews, guys! It was nice to see all of the responses this week—they make me smile. :)

**Anonymous**: You're definitely thinking in the right direction, though I'm loath to say more just because I don't want to give away the surprise. Let's just say that I kind of conveniently haven't mentioned something that will be coming up. And yeah, I figured you meant the Dante blurting stuff out scene—as much fun as Dante and Lady having a casual conversation about alcohol was at the time, I don't think we need to see it retold, haha!

**Eric Draven 201**: Dante's totally got that Roman nose going on, which makes me want to assume he's Italian. REPRESENT! And I had the _same_ image in mind, which is _exactly_ why I included that last line at the end! It was too funny not to have him get really excited.

**Pink Priestess**: Heeeee, smexy is right. I'm glad you adored the chapter! :D

**Bakabara**: It's cool that you can't name it, because Lady can't either! XDDD I'm so glad you enjoyed everything around the transformation sequence, because I actually had a lot of trouble figuring out how I wanted to write it... I guess it worked!

**kyokoaurora**: Thank you! I hope you enjoy this one as well!

**KuteInsanity**: I totally laughed too! (A+ ERIC DRAVEN) Dante's self-consciousness was something that I admittedly didn't pay enough attention to in _Passage of Time_ with the exception of the odd reference, but opted to develop a bit for the purposes of _Ephemerality_. The whole demon thing is more important for Lady's story than it was for Dante's anyway, even though it's Dante's demon/humanity (demonity?) that's in question in the first place.

**Ashley**: I KNOW RIGHT! XDDDD

Well folks, the next chapter is going to be about the drunken conversation... Yikes. Meanwhile, enjoy another slightly risqué chapter, this one about sex! My friend told me that I should write one about rock and roll after this, but ... no, I don't have time for that lol. And for your information, yes, this chapter _does_ take place between the time that Dante hid Lady in the dumpster so he could finish off the demon himself, and the time that he asked her on that date.

**Warning: Do not read this until you have read the corresponding chapter (in this case II.3) of **_**The Passage of Time**_**!**

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**Ephemerality**

_12: Lust_

(corresponds to a moment hidden amidst the events of II.3: Pax Romana)

Somewhere down the line, Lady had realized that Dante was getting laid fairly regularly. This made her incredibly jealous—not of the women he was fucking, but of the fact that he was having sex when _she_ wasn't.

Lady had never been regularly sexually active. She and David had enjoyed their three months of sex before the breakup, and in the time after she graduated from high school and started working full-time as a demon hunter, she had gone on the occasional date that had occasionally ended in sex, but nothing lasted beyond the one night and she hadn't exactly wanted it to. Either way it was a habit she had fallen out of, not of a lack of sexual drive, but simply because there was something about one-night stands that didn't sit well with her—didn't sit well with _Mary_, Lady guessed.

So three years, four months, and eight days after the last time she had sex—_not that she was keeping track_—when she saw some strawberry blonde bimbo walk out of Devil May Cry at 11:10 AM when she showed up a few minutes late for work, Lady couldn't help but feel her blood boil. Dante had the gall of looking surprised when Lady walked into the office with an appalled look on her face, saying, as if it were a _real_ excuse: "What? I have _needs_."

"So do I, but I don't sleep with whores," she had almost said, but instead shrugged off the comment with a simple: "I don't care," sat down in her usual spot on the sofa, and opened up her copy of _The New York Times_.

Sexy literature.

Dante must have assumed that this was Lady's way of saying that she didn't mind seeing the skanks he slept with, because from that point on she was graced with the presence of the women that he slept with as they left in the morning, a sex-sated look on their makeup-smeared faces as they flounced through the main room in their four-inch stripper heels without so much as glancing at the brunette sitting on the couch reading _The New York Times_. In theory she _didn't_ mind—why would she? He had probably been doing this all along, but had simply been negligent about kicking out this slut that one morning when he was usually so good about making sure that the girls were out before Lady could show up. And to his credit, she never saw any girls the morning after a job, which to her mind was a sign that he was taking his job seriously.

Still, she wondered why it became okay for him to flaunt his sexual exploits in front of her. She almost wanted to tell him that he had to stop because it was a little disrespectful to her and to the friendship they had just spent the past year and a half kindling, but if she did he would undoubtedly grin and ask her if she was jealous of the girls. To avoid any of that awkwardness, she told herself that she should just tolerate it.

Besides, these girls didn't know they were sleeping with a _demon_, and for the sake of their mental health she hoped that they never found out. Being friends with a demon, like she was, was one thing—fucking one was something else altogether. She had decided that long ago, after her temporary moment of folly on Temen-ni-gru that she preferred not to think about.

To make up for how much she wanted to bitch Dante out, Lady gave the regulars—the ones that she recognized from multiple encounters—entertaining nicknames by which she could privately refer to them. There was, for instance, the blonde with the incredibly fake tan and boobs, who she liked to call The Silicone Bunny. Then there was brunette with wild curly hair and breasts that to the bitch's credit seemed real, known as Curly McTits. There was also the redhead who had both a real first name and a specific skill for which Dante had praised her at one point—information that she really hadn't needed to hear, thank you very much—and seeing as Lady rather enjoyed alliteration, the girl was thereby dubbed Hand Job Hannah.

Lady's least favorite of the girls was actually one of Dante's favorites, or at least the most easy and available judging by how often she came over: it was the strawberry blonde from the first day, whose name happened to be Claire. But to Lady, her name was Trashy Bimbo Skank, and she did not actually have strawberry blonde hair. Instead, Trashy Bimbo Skank had STDs that Dante wouldn't catch anyway because his freakish demon healing abilities would keep him safe from the throes of venereal disease. But that didn't change the fact that Trashy Bimbo Skank had probably slept with more men than he had ever met, picking up a few things along the way in exchange for losing some traction.

Maybe she was being unfair. Maybe Trashy Bimbo Skank was a whore because she needed to pay for college, or for a child whose father had walked away for some other whore, or some other sob story with which Lady might have sympathized under different circumstances. But she highly doubted it, judging by the self-satisfied little smirk that Trashy Bimbo Skank wore along with her four-inch clear stripper heels whenever she left in the morning, always aimed at Lady as if she were _missing out on something_. As if she _wanted_ Dante.

Maybe she missed sex, but she wasn't_ that_ desperate.

On a particularly slow night, Dante suggested that they go to a bar to kill the time, since they didn't have any alcohol in the office and Lady figured she would rather have someone serve her drinks than have to make them herself. She was also grateful for the opportunity to perhaps spend some quality time with Dante—they had ended up bonding in the first place over beer, and while she thought it a little strange that the times they seemed to be happiest together were the times that they shared a bottle of liquor, she wasn't going to question it.

Things had been a little bit strained as of late, particularly once he had started flaunting his sexual exploits. It wasn't like he was standing in front of her, pointing, and laughing because _he_ was getting laid and the closest she would get to having sex was a trashy romance novel, but it was still inconsiderate. On top of that, he had started treating her more like a china doll than a hunting partner, something that she didn't at all appreciate. Just because she had needed him to step forward and do the hard work sometimes due to the fact that bullets didn't _always_ work, it didn't mean that she needed to be shoved into dumpsters or shielded by his big stupid body just because a demon bigger than a car was trying to eat them. She wasn't a little girl; she was a _lady_, no pun intended. She could take care of herself.

That was why she wanted to go out drinking. Last time she had wanted to clear up any weirdness between them, it had just taken a bottle of vodka, two shot glasses, and whatever had been on TV at the time—because she really couldn't remember what they had been watching, only that, several shots in, it had been the funniest movie she had ever seen. The drinking together technique was tried and true, ever since she had used it a year and half or so earlier to solidify their friendship in the first place. The last thing she wanted was for things to be weird when they had a job that involved them having each other's backs. And besides, she rather enjoyed their casual friendship, and didn't want to lose the only friend she had made since Mary became Lady, and especially not to a bunch of skanks.

Naturally, Dante's idea of going to a bar was actually going to Love Planet, a fine establishment if there ever was one. Lady should have known that the night was going to go badly as soon as she saw the pink fluorescent sign glowing in the distance.

"We're going to _Love Planet_?" Lady asked in disbelief. There was inconsiderate, and then there was _inconsiderate_. Seriously, why the hell would she want to go to a _strip club_ to mend her straining friendship, when it was Dante's involvement with all of these skanks that was getting on her nerves? If only telling him outright wouldn't have led to an incredibly awkward conversation, because if she had the option, she would politely—or not—inform him that going to Love Planet was not what she had in mind.

"There's a bar, isn't there?" Dante supplied, as if it made it better. Either he didn't know how much this was bothering Lady, or he just didn't care. If it were the latter, they would have some _serious _problems.

"Yeah, but Dante, it's ... I'm going to be the one woman in there who's _not_ a stripper," Lady said uncomfortably.

"That's not true! I've seen lesbians in there a bunch of times!" Dante provided before walking towards the building, leaving her standing awkwardly on the curb. With a few quick words to the bouncer—they were probably _best friends_ or something due to the amount of time Dante likely spent at Love Planet—he strolled in, an entitled little smirk on his face because _damn it_ he was hoping to score that night. She was _not_ going to be his wingman.

Wing_woman_?

She walked towards the entrance with a roll of her eyes, stopping out of courtesy once she reached the bouncer. Hey, maybe he would turn her away for one reason or another, and she would have a legitimate excuse to go home and read a book instead of going to a fucking _strip club_.

"Dante said you're with him, so you can just go in," the bouncer said.

Crap. Well, she had _hoped_, anyway. "Thank you," Lady said despite herself.

"If I were you, I'd go up on stage and see if you can get the guys to pay for your drinks," the bouncer added. "Because you'd do pretty well for yourself."

She gritted her teeth and flashed an incredibly insincere smile. Great, this was going to be the first in a slew of propositions. She hadn't considered _that_. "No," she answered.

"Ah, that's too bad." The burly man shrugged. "Well, you can head on in. If you change your mind, just let one of the staffers know and they'll let you get up on the stage."

"Thank you, I'll keep it in mind," Lady lied, her teeth still clenched together as she walked into the building, nearly choking from the smell of cigarettes. She had never actually been into Love Planet before, but knew that it was one of the few establishments left in the city where smoking was allowed inside. She could tell that Dante had been there instead of one of his other usual bars from the smoky perfume that still clung to his clothes and hair by the next morning, which masked the smell of the cheap perfume worn by the girls who slept with him. She wasn't sure if he smoked—knowing his history with drugs, she wouldn't be surprised at all if he did—but he smelt like it after a night at Love Planet.

To her surprise, Dante wasn't seated at one of the tables around the stage, but at the bar itself, already nursing a beer as another cold one sat nearby. From the bottle, she could tell that it was one of the brands that she favored—he had actually gone ahead and bought her a beer.

"Got started without me?" Lady asked, smirking as she took a seat on the bar stool next to his.

"You were taking too long," Dante explained, shrugging. "This beer's on me, by the way."

"You only owe me a few hundred more," Lady joked, nearly laughing as Dante nearly spit out what he had already been sipping. "Don't think I haven't been keeping track of how much money you owe me."

"I'll pay you back," Dante half-heartedly promised.

"You always _say_ that," Lady commented, taking a sip of beer. She decided to let it slide—she wanted to make sure that the night was fun. It seemed like it was going to be anyway, and didn't want to do anything to ruin the good mood that had already been set, despite being in the most surprising of places.

Naturally, after several hours of beers and joking—and barely any time spent staring at the girls up on the stage, to Lady's endless surprise—Trashy Bimbo Skank just _had_ to show up to ruin the fun. One minute they were talking and the next that strawberry blonde little _bitch_ was straddling Dante's lap and taking a sip of his beer, smiling coyly as if she were the hottest shit in the room.

She wasn't.

"Claire," Dante said enthusiastically, his words obviously slurred from the amount they had been drinking. Lady also felt her head swimming, though probably not as much as Dante's was, but Trashy Bimbo Skank's arrival was somewhat sobering and she already felt a little more clear-headed.

"_Hey_ Dante," Trashy Bimbo Skank said seductively, teasing a few fingers into his hair. "I didn't know you were coming tonight."

"Slow night, so Lady and I decided to come here to hang out instead," Dante explained, his hands wrapping around her waist and scooting her forward a bit. He glanced over at Lady really quickly, apparently capable of looking at things other than Trashy Bimbo Skank's admittedly unimpressive chest—at least The Silicone Bunny, Curly McTits, and Hand Job Hannah had a little something to offer in that department—and shooting her a quick smile. "Have you two met?"

"No," Trashy Bimbo Skank responded, turning her head to give Lady a quick go-over.

Lady wanted to say: "Not officially," but opted not to. Did seeing someone about twice a week as they pranced out of Dante's bedroom count as meeting them?

"I'm _Claire_." Trashy Bimbo Skank offered, not bothering to reach out her hand to shake Lady's. That was cool, because she wouldn't have taken it anyway. She also had no intention of calling the bitch by her real name when Trashy Bimbo Skank rolled off the mental tongue so nicely. "You're Dante's _business partner_, right? In ... _that_ line of work?"

Lady nodded curtly. "Yes, that's right. We've been working together for nearly three years now."

"When Dante first mentioned you a while back, I thought you'd be kind of butch," Trashy Bimbo Skank mused, tilting her head up as if it were a cute gesture. Lady wasn't sure if she should be more offended by the fact that this had apparently been going on for quite some time, or that Trashy Bimbo Skank had assumed that she had to be masculine to be a demon hunter. "But actually, you're kind of hot."

Not that Lady considered herself particularly stunning, but the fact that Trashy Bimbo Skank considered her only "kind of" hot and was currently staring at her as if she had won the prize—the prize being Dante—was probably one of the most obnoxious things she had ever had to put up with. At _least_ Lady had a nicer chest than the little mosquito bites that Trashy Bimbo Skank tried to pass off as breasts. _And_ Lady imagined that, without the makeup, Trashy Bimbo Skank was kind of horrendous-looking. How could Dante sleep with _that_?

"You ever consider _dancing_?" Trashy Bimbo Skank asked. By dancing, Lady assumed she was referring to _stripping_. "You have nice tits—you'd probably do pretty well."

Again, Lady was _entirely_ unamused by this reference to her promising career as a stripper. But before she could point out that, unlike Trashy Bimbo Skank, she didn't need to exhibit her body for the perverse interests of the patrons of establishments like Love Planet, Dante cut in with a barking laugh: "Lady'd _never_ do anything like _that_!" Trashy Bimbo Skank laughed as well before turning back to Dante and leaning in to capture his lips in a kiss.

As if being ignored in favor of a drunken make out session wasn't insulting enough, the fact that Dante had just _completely_ dismissed her ... well, it _hurt_ oddly. This was the guy who had blatantly hit on her the day that they met—including an attempted kiss—and though he had stopped pursuing her sexual attention in favor of being her friend, she still noticed him checking her out, so clearly he still thought she was _attractive_. So what was it, then? Was he trying to _punish_ her for turning him down so many times, or implying that she was _frigid_ just because she didn't try to show off her own sexual wants and needs? Or was he just _that_ inconsiderate?

It took a lot to make Lady feel self-conscious and vulnerable—usually what broke her down were things that reminded her of her parents, or of the night on Temen-ni-gru—but being so blatantly ignored by the man she chanced to call her best friend in front of some bitch he liked to fuck...

It took her pride down a few notches.

"So I've been watching you all night," she heard a voice whisper from behind her, hot breath tickling her ear. She squirmed uncomfortably—she hadn't even heard this guy approach. "You gonna get up there and dance at any point?"

"I'm not a stripper," Lady hissed, turning to face the man who had approached her. He was an unassuming-looking guy in his late twenties—if she remembered him correctly, he was a part of that bachelor party, or whatever one called an assembly of male friends who enjoyed watching naked women dancing in their faces.

"That's too bad," the man said, smiling coyly, leaning against the bar to close the distance between them.

"I'm here with a _friend_," Lady calmly pointed out. Maybe this guy would take a hint and leave her alone if he knew she was there with other people, and _Dante_ no less. After all, unlike Dante, she didn't do one-night stands. Not anymore.

The man raised an eyebrow, peering past her shoulder at where she knew Dante was sitting. "Well, I doubt you're here with Claire—" _Trashy Bimbo Skank_, she wanted to correct. "—so I guess you're here with the gentleman with the white hair."

"Yeah, that's right," she answered. There was something about the look on this man's face that was _too_ mischievous. Somehow, she didn't want to turn around and look at what he was looking at.

"I don't think he's paying any attention to you," the man pointed out, glancing back at Lady with a smirk on his face. "I think he might be a bit _distracted_."

"He can do whatever he _wants_," Lady coldly replied. Why was this guy still talking to her, anyway? She only wished that dealing with humans were as easy as dealing with demons: if you didn't want to deal with them, you shot them. "I can take care of myself."

"Still, it's such a shame that a pretty girl like you is sitting here by herself while her friend gets it on with a stripper," the man continued, leaning closer to her.

"If you think that's a reason for me to _talk to you_, then forget it." As right as the man was, she was utterly fed up with this bullshit: she was going _home_. "Now if you'll excuse me," she continued, starting to turn in her stool so she could get the bartender's attention, "I'm going ho—"

Trashy Bimbo Skank was still in Dante's lap, leaning back with one hand gripping the bar counter, head thrown up in pleasure, red lips parted, quiet breaths escaping her. Dante attacked her neck with his lips and tongue, searching out pleasure points and being rewarded with a small gasp when he found them. Trashy Bimbo Skank's free hand reach down towards the seat of his pants and trace her fingers up towards the area where legs met waist; Dante groaned in pleasure—

Lady turned away, wide-eyed and red-faced, staring down at the lacquered surface of the bar in an attempt to force away the image of Dante and Trashy Bimbo Skank, not yet in the throes of passion but certainly on their way. The sounds continued pounding in her ear, playing over and over again as if to remind her that Dante was going to get laid tonight, Dante had needs too, Dante enjoyed sex, Dante, Dante, _Dante_—

"What are you proposing?" Lady asked hollowly, barely turning to look back at the smirking man to her right. Maybe she was making a mistake, but fuck it, she was a little drunk and even more embarrassed by what she had just seen, and needed something to burn it all away. Mary would ordinarily be screaming in her head and protesting Lady's actions, as she had strangely been doing more and more often lately. But it was after Mary's bedtime now: Lady could do whatever the fuck she wanted. Or, more aptly, who.

"How about you come back to my place, and maybe we can make your friend over there angry for ignoring you like that," the man offered.

Lady snorted; she doubted having sex would offend Dante. He'd probably give her a high-five. "How about you buy me a drink first?" Lady asked. "Just a formality."

"Understood." The man grinned and flagged down the bartender. "What do you want?" he asked Lady.

"Long Island Iced Tea," she answered without hesitation. If she was going to do this, she needed to be a _lot_ drunker.

The man raised an eyebrow as the bartender went off to make the drink—hopefully a very strong one. "I don't know if I should be offended or not," the man stated, tilting his head slightly to the side in a gesture that was not unlike the one Trashy Bimbo Skank had made earlier.

"Don't complain, you're still getting laid," she snapped.

The man raised his hands in defeat. "Hey, easy. I'm just saying."

Lady chugged the drink when it arrived, and as she followed the stranger out—as she never learned his name—she didn't leave any money behind for the drinks she and Dante had been enjoying earlier in the evening. Let _Dante_ pay for it, since he owed her a shit ton of money in the first place.

He wouldn't remember any of it in the morning anyway, and when he would undoubtedly ask her in the morning when she had left Love Planet because he certainly hadn't noticed, Lady would simply tell him that she went home early. Everything else was none of his fucking business.


End file.
